THE LECTUEEES PEEFACE. 

Let it be remembered, that these Lectures were delivered to my own 
congregation. They were entered upon, without xny having previously 
marked out any plan or outline of them, and have been pursued, from 
week to week, as one subject naturally introduced another, and as, from 
one lecture to another, I saw the state of our people seemed to require. 

I consented to have the Editor of the Evangelist report them, upon 
his own responsibility, because he thought that it might excite a deeper 
interest in, and extend the usefulness of, his paper. And as I am now 
a Pastor, and have not sufficient health to labor as an Evangelist, and 
as it has pleased the Head of the Church to give me some experience 
in revivals of religion, I thought it possible that, while I was doing the 
work of a Pastor in my own church, I might, in this way, be of some 
little service to the churches abroad. 

I found a particular inducement to this course, in the fact that on my 
return from the Mediterranean, I learned, with pain, that the spirit of 
revival had greatly declined in the United States, and that a spirit of 
| igling and controversy alarmingly prevailed. 

. The peculiar circumstances of the church, and the state of revivals, 

wa . such, as unavoidably to lead me to the discussion of some points 

I would gladly have avoided, had the omission been consistent 

u my main design, to reach and arouse the church, when she was 

fast settling down upon her lees. 

I am far from setting up the claim of infallibility upon this or any 
other subject. I have given my own views, so far as I have gone, with- 
out pretending to have exhausted the subject, or to have spoken in the 
best possible manner upon the points I have discussed. 

I am too well acquainted with the state of the church, and especially 
with the state of some of its ministers, to expect to escape without 
censure. I have felt obliged to say some things that I fear will not, in 
all instances, be received as kindly as they were intended. But what- 
ever may be the result of saying the truth as it respects some, I have 
reason to believe, that the great body of praying people will receive 
and be benefited by what I have said. 

What I have said upon the subject of prayer, will not, I am well 
aware, be understood and received by a certain portion of the church, 
and all I can say is, " He that hath an ear to hear, let him hear." 

(iii) 



iy THE LECTURER'S PREFACE. 

I had not the most distant idea until recently, that these Lectures, in 
this, or any other form, would ever grow into a book ; but the urgent 
call for their publication, in a volume, and the fact that I have had re- 
peated assurances that the reading of them in the Evangelist, has been 
owned and blessed, to the quickening of individuals and churches, and 
has resulted in the conversion of many sinners, have led me to consent 
to their publication in this imperfect form. 

The Reporter has succeeded, in general, in giving an outline of the 
Lectures, as they were delivered. His report, however, would, in gen- 
eral, make no more than a full skeleton of what was said on the subject 
at the time. In justice to the Reporter, I would say, that on reading 
his reports, in his paper, although there were some mistakes and mis- 
apprehensions, yet I have been surprised that, without stenography, he 
could so nearly report my meaning. 

As for literary merit, they have none ; nor do they lay claim to any. 
It was no part of my design to deliver elegant Lectures. They were 
my most familiar Friday evening discourses ; and my great, and I may 
add my only object, was to have them understood and felt. 

In correcting the Lectures for a volume, I have not had time, nor was 
it thought advisable to remodel them, and change the style in which 
they had been reported. I have, in some few instances, changed the 
phraseology, when a thought had been very awkwardly expressed, or 
when the true idea had not been given. But I have, in nearly every 
instance, left the sentences as they were reported when the thought 
was perspicuously expressed, although the style might have been im- 
proved by emendation. They were the editor's reports, and as such 
they must go before the public, with such little additions and altera- 
tions, as I have had time to make. Could I have written them out in 
full, I doubt not but they might have been more acceptable to many 
readers. But this was impossible, and the only alternative was, to let 
the public have them as they are, or refuse to let them go out in the 
form of a volume at all. I am sorry they are not better Lectures, and in 
a more attracting form ; but I have done what I could under the circum- 
stances ; and, as it is the wish of many whom I love, and delight to please 
and honor, to have them, although in this imperfect form, they must 
have them. 

C. G. FINNEY. 

By perusing the above Preface, the reader will get a clue to the time 
and circumstances that led to the delivery and publication of these Lec- 
tures. In revising them for a new edition, I have done little more than 
correct the phraseology in a few instances, add a few foot-notes, and 
replace the last two Lectures by newly-written ones on the same texts, 



and prepared especially for this edition. These Lectures are distinct 
from the course I deliver to my theological class upon the same subject. 
TMt course I may publish before my death. These Lectures have been 
translated in the Welsh and French languages, and have been very 
extensively circulated wherever the English or either of those lan- 
guages is understood. One house in London published 80,000 copies 
in English. They are still in type and in market in Europe, and I 
have the great satisfaction of knowing that they have been made a 
great blessing to thousands of souls. Consequently, I have not thought 
it wise to recast them for the sake' of giving them a more attractive 
form. God has owned and blessed the reading of them as they have 
been, and with the exceptions above noticed, I have given them to the 
present and coming generations. If the reader will peruse and remem- 
ber the foregoing preface, he will understand what I said of the church 
and some of the ministers, and why I said it. I beseech my brethren 
not to tabe amiss what I have said, but rather to be assured that every 
sentence has been spoken in love, and often with a sorrowful heart. 
May God continue to add His blessing to the reading of these Lectures. 

THE AUTHOR. 
Oberles College, Oct. 22, 1868. 



ADVEETISEMENT BY THE EEPOETER 

TnE work of reporting these Lectures was undertaken for the pur- 
pose of increasing the interest and usefulness of the New York Evan- 
gelist. The Reporter is wholly unacquainted with short-h#nd, and has, 
therefore, only aimed to give a sketch of the leading thoughts of the 
discourse. It is hardly necessary to mention that Mr. Finney never 
writes his sermons, but guides his course of argument by a skeleton, 
or brief, carefully prepared, and so compact, that it can be written on 
one side of a card, about half as large as one of these printed pages. 
His manner is direct, and his language colloquial and Saxon, and his 
illustrations are drawn from the commonest incidents and maxims of 
life. The Reporter has aimed to preserve, as much as he could, the 
style of the speaker, and is thought to have been in some degree suc- 
cessful. If, in any cases, by letting his language run in a colloquial 
strain, he has made the copy more simple and homely than the original, 
he hopes to be pardoned easily for a fault by no means prevalent. 

If any bne should attempt to criticise the style of these Reports, he 
will assuredly lose his labor ; for the only ambition of the Reporter has 
been, to make such a use of language as should fully convey the mean- 
ing, and fairly exhibit the manner, of the Lecturer. When words have 
done this, they have done their great work. The notes were taken 
with a pencil, and transcribed in great haste, and sent to the printer 
without revision. In preparing them for republication, in this form, 
Mr. Finney has reviewed them with reference only to this point — the 
correct expression of the sentiment. The style of an off-hand sketch 
has been preserved, partly of choice, and partly from necessity. There 
was no time to remodel the work, and the public voice seemed to be, 
that it was more attractive and more useful in its present condensed 
form. Mr. Finney has, therefore, done little more than to amend where 
the Reporter misapprehended the meaning, or did not express it with 
sufficient distinctness. He has enlarged in a few places where the 
illustrations, as given by the Reporter, seemed to be incomplete. 

My labor with these sketches is now done ; and its results are sent 
forth in this permanent form, with the prayer, that God would employ 
the book, as he has already done the newspaper edition, to rouse, and 
teach, and strengthen his people, and to guide, unite, and encourage 
zealous Christians of all classes, in the great duty of saving sinners, 

J. L. 

New York, April, 1835. 
(vi) 



CONTENTS. 

LECTURE I. 

PAGE 

What a Revival of Religion is 9 

LECTURE II. 
When a Revival is to be Expected 22 

LECTURE III. 
How to Promote a Revival 35 

LECTURE IV. 
Prevailing Prayer 48 

LECTURE V. 
The Prayer of Faith 67 

LECTURE VI. 
Spirit of Prayer 83 

LECTURE VII. 
Be Filled with the Spirit 101 

LECTURE VIII. 
Meetings for Prayer 118 

LECTURE IX. 
Means to be Used with Sinners 134 

LECTURE X. 
To win Souls requires Wisdom 149 

LECftTRE XI. 
A Wise Minister will be Successful » . 166 

(vii) 



Vlll CONTENTS. 

LECTURE XII. 
How to Preach the Gospel 185 

LECTURE XIII. 
How Churches can Help Ministers. 213 

LECTURE XIV. 
Measures to Promote Reviyals 238 

LECTURE XV. 
Hinderances to Revivals 263 

LECTURE XVI. 
Necessity and Effect of Union 294 

LECTURE XVII. 
False Comforts for Sinners 317 

LECTURE XVIII. 
Directions to Sinners 345 

LECTURE XIX. 
Instructions to Converts 364 

LECTURE XX. 
Instruction of Young Converts , . . 392 

LECTURE XXI. 
Backsliders in Heart .* 412 

LECTURE XXII. 
Growth in Grace 428 



LECTURES. 



LECTURE I. 



WHAT A EEVIVAL OP RELIGION IS. 

Text.— O Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the 
years made known ; in wrath remember mercy. — Hab. iii. 2. 

It is supposed that the prophet Habakkuk was contempo- 
rary with Jeremiah, and that this prophecy was uttered in an- 
ticipation of the Babylonish captivity. Looking at the judg- 
ments which were speedily to come upon his nation, the soul 
of the prophet was wrought up to an agony, and he cries out 
in his distress, " Lord, revive thy work." As if he had 
said, " Lord, grant that thy judgments may not make Israel 
desolate. In the midst of these awful years, let the judg- 
ments of God be made the means of reviving religion among 
us. In wrath remember mercy." 

Religion is the work of man. It is something for man to do. 
It consists in obeying God with and from the heart. It is 
man's duty. It is true, God induces him to do it He influ- 
ences him by his Spirit, because of his great wickedness and 
reluctance to obey. If it were not necessary for God to in- 
fluence men — if men were disposed to obey God, there would 
be no occasion to pray, " O Lord, revive thy work." The 
ground of necessity for such a prayer is, that men are wholly 
indisposed to obey ; and unless God interpose the influence 
of his Spirit, not a man on earth will ever obey the commands 
of God. 

A "Revival of Religion" presupposes a declension. Al- 
most all the religion in the world has been produced by revi- 
vals. God has found it necessary to take advantage of the 
1* (9) 



10 WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 

excitability there is in mankind, to produce powerful excite- 
ments among them, before he can lead them to obey. Men 
are so spiritually sluggish, there are so many things to lead 
their minds off from religion, and to oppose the influence of 
the Gospel, that it is necessary to raise an excitement among 
them, till the tide rises so high as to sweep away the opposing 
obstacles. They must be so excited that they will break over 
these counteracting influences, before they will obey God Not 
that excited feeling is religion, for it is not ; but it is excited 
desire, appetite and feeling that prevents religion. The will 
is, in a sense, enslaved by the carnal and worldly desires. 
Hence it is necessary to awaken men to a sense of guilt and 
danger, and thus produce an excitement of counter feeling 
and desire which will break the power of carnal and worldly 
desire and leave the will free to obey God. 

Look back at the history of the Jews, and you will see that 
God used to maintain religion among them by special occa- 
sions, when there would be a great excitement, and people 
would turn to the Lord. And after they had been thus re- 
vived, it would be but a short time before there would be so 
many counteracting influences brought to bear upon them, 
that religion would decline, and keep on declining, till God 
could have time — so to speak — to convict them of sin by his 
Spirit and rebuke them by his providence, and thus so gain 
the attention of the masses to the great subject of salvation, 
as to produce a widespread awakening of religious interest, and 
consequently a revival of religion. Then the counteracting 
causes would again operate, and religion would decline, and 
the nation would be swept away in the vortex of luxury, idol- 
atry, and pride. 

There is so little 'principle in the church, so little firmness 
and stability of purpose, that unless the religious feelings are 
awakened and kept excited, counter worldly feeling and excite- 
ment will prevail, and men will not obey God. They have so 
little knowledge, and their principles are so weak, that unless 
they are excited, they will go back from the path of duty, and 
do nothing to promote the glory of God. The state of the 
world is still such, and probably will be till the millennium is 
fully come, that religion must be mainly promoted by means 
of revivals. How long and how often has the experiment 
been tried, to bring the church to act steadily for God, with- 
out these periodical excitements. Many good men have sup- 
posed, and still suppose, that the best way to promote reli- 
gion, is to go along uniformly, and gather in the ungodly grad- 
ually, and without excitement. But however sound such rea- 



WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 11 

soning may appear in the abstract, facts demonstrate its futili- 
ty. If the church were far enough advanced in knowledge, 
and had stability of principle enough to keep awoke, such a 
course would do ; but the church is so little enhghtened, and 
there are so many counteracting causes, that she will not go 
steadily to work without a special interest being awakened. As 
the millennium advances, it is probable that these periodical 
excitements will be unknown. Then the church will be en- 
hghtened, and the counteracting causes removed, and the en- 
tire church will be in a state of habitual and steady obedi- 
ence to God. The entire church will stand and take the in- 
fant mind, and cultivate it for God. Children will be trained 
up in the way they should go, and there will be no such tor- 
rents of worldliness, and fashion, and covetousness, to bear 
away the piety of the church, as soon as the excitement of a 
revival is withdrawn. 

It is very desirable it should be so. It is very desirable that 
the church should go on steadily in a course of obedience 
without these excitements. Such excitements are liable to in- 
jure the health. Our nervous system is so strung that any 
powerful excitement, if long continued, injures our health and 
unfits us for duty. If religion is ever to have a pervading in- 
fluence in the world, it cannot be so ; this spasmodic religion 
must be done away. Then it will be uncalled for. Chris- 
tians will not sleep the greater part of the time, and once iu 
a while wake up, and rub their eyes, and bluster about, and 
vociferate a little while, and then go to sleep again. Then 
there will be no need that ministers should wear themselves 
out, and kill themse]ves, by their efforts to roll back the flood 
of worldly influence that sets in upon the church. But as 
yet the state of the Christian world is such, that to expect to 
promote religion without excitements is unphilosophical and 
absurd. The great political, and other worldly excitements 
that agitate Christendom, are all unfriendly to religion, and 
divert the mind from the interests of the soul. Now these 
excitements can only be counteracted by i^eligious excitements. 
And until there is religious principle in the world to put down 
irreligious excitements, it is vain to try to promote religion, 
except by counteracting excitements. This is true in philos- 
ophy, and it is a historical fact. 

It is altogether improbable that religion will ever make pro- 
gress among heathen nations except through the influence of 
revivals. The attempt is now making to do it by education, 
and other cautious and gradual improvements. But so long 
as the laws of mind remain what they are, it cannot be done 



12 WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 

in this way. There must be excitement sufficient "to wake up 
the dormant moral powers, and roll back the tide of degrada- 
tion and sin. And precisely so far as our own land approxi- 
mates to heathenism, it is impossible for God or man to pro- 
mote religion in such a state of things but by powerful ex- 
citements. This is evident from the fact that this has always 
been the way in which God has done it. God does not cre- 
ate these excitements, and choose this method to promote re- 
ligion for nothing or without reason. Where mankind are so 
reluctant to obey God, they will not act until they are excited. 
For instance, how many there are who know that they ought 
to be religious, but they are afraid if they become pious they 
shall be laughed at by their companions. Many are wedded 
to idols, others are procrastinating repentance, until they are 
settled in life, or until they have secured some favorite world- 
ly interest. Such persons will never give up their false shame, 
or relinquish their ambitious schemes, till they are so excited 
by a sense of guilt and danger that they cannot contain them- 
selves any longer. 

These remarks are designed only as an introduction to the 
discourse. I shall now proceed with the main design, to show, 
I. What a revival of religion is not ; 
II. What it is ; and, 
m. The agencies employed in promoting it. 

I. A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS NOT A MIRACLE. 

1. A miracle has been generally defined to be, a Divine in- 
terference, setting aside or suspending the laws of nature. It 
is not a miracle in this sense. All the laws of matter and 
mind remain in force. They are neither suspended nor set 
aside in a revival. 

2. It is not a miracle according to another definition of the 
term miracle — something above the powers of nature. There is 
nothing in religion beyond the ordinary powers of nature. It 
consists entirely in the right exercise of the powers of nature. 
It is just that, and nothing else. When mankind become re- 
ligious, they are not enabled to put forth exertions which they 
were unable before to put forth. They only exert the powers 
they had before in a different way, and use them for the glory 
of God. 

3. It is not a miracle, or dependent on a miracle, in any 
sense. It is a purely philosophical result of the right use of 
the constituted means — as much so as any other effect produced 
by the application of means. There may be a miracle among 



WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 13 

its antecedent causes, or there may not. The apostles em- 
ployed miracles, simply as means by which they arrested at- 
tention to their message, and established its divine authority. 
But the miracle was not the revival. The miracle was one 
thing ; the revival that followed it was quite another thing. 
The revivals in the apostles' days were connected with mira- 
cles, but they were not miracles. 

I said that a revival is the result of the right use of the ap- 
propriate means. The means which God has enjoined for 
the production of a revival, doubtless have a natural tendency 
to produce a revival. Otherwise God would not have enjoin- 
ed them. But means will not produce a revival, we all know, 
without the blessing of God. No more will grain, when it is 
sowed, produce a crop without the blessing of God. It is im- 
possible for us to say that there is not as direct an influence 
or agency from God, to produce a crop of grain, as there is 
to produce a revival. "What are the laws of nature according 
to which it is supposed that grain yields a crop ? They are 
nothing but the constituted manner of the operations of God. 
In the Bible, the word of God is compared to grain, and 
preaching is compared to sowing seed, and the results to the 
springing up and growth of the crop. And the result is just 
as philosophical in the one case, as in the other, and is as nat- 
urally connected with the cause ; or, more correctly, a revival is 
as naturally a result of the use of the appropriate means a^a 
crop is of the use of its appropriate means. It is true that 
religion does not properly belong to the category of cause and 
effect ; but although it is not caused by means, yet it has its 
occasion, and may as naturally and certainly result from its 
occasion as a crop does from its cause. 

I wish this idea to be impressed on all your minds, for there 
has long been an idea prevalent that promoting religion has 
something very peculiar in it, not to be judged of by the or- 
dinary rules of cause and effect ; in short, that there is no 
connection of the means with the result, and no tendency in 
the means to produce the effect. No doctrine is more dan- 
gerous than this to the prosperity of the church, and nothing 
more absurd. 

Suppose a man were to go and preach this doctrine among 
farmers, about their sowing grain. Let him tell thgm. that 
God is a sovereign, and will give them a crop only when it 
pleases him, and that for them to plow and plant and labor 
as if they expected to raise a crop is very wrong, and taking 
the work out of the hands of God, that it interferes with his 
sovereignty, and is going on in their own strength ; and that 



14 WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 

there is no connection between the means and the result on 
which they can depend. And now, suppose the farmers 
should believe such doctrine. Why, they would starve the 
world to death. 

Just such results will follow from the church's being per- 
suaded that promoting religion is somehow so mysteriously a 
subject of Divine sovereignty, that there is no natural con- 
nection between the means and the end. "What are the re- 
sults ? Why, generation after generation has gone down to 
hell. No doubt more than five thousand millions have gone 
down to hell, while the church has been dreaming, and wait- 
ing for God to save them without the use of means. It has 
been the devil's most successful means of destroying souls. 
The connection is as clear in religion as it is when the farmer 
sows his grain. 

There is one fact under the government of God, worthy of 
universal notice, and of everlasting remembrance ; which is, 
that the most useful and important things are most easily and 
certainly obtained by the use of the appropriate means. This 
is evidently a principle in the Divine administration. Hence, 
all the necessaii.es of life are obtained with great certainty by 
the use of the simplest means. The luxuries are more diffi- 
cult to obtain ; the means to procure them are more intricate 
and less certain in their results ; while things absolutely hurt- 
ful and poisonous, such as alcohol and the, like, are often ob- 
tained only by torturing nature, and making use of a kind of 
infernal sorcery to procure the death-dealing abomination. 
This principle holds true in moral government, and as spirit- 
ual blessings are of surpassing importance, we should expect 
their attainment to be connected with great certainty with the 
use of the appropriate means ; and such we find to be the fact; 
and I fully believe that could facts be known, it would be found 
that when the appointed means have been rightly used, spirit- 
ual blessings have been obtained with greater uniformity than 
temporal ones. 

n. I AM TO SHOW WHAT A REVIVAL IS. 

It is the renewal of the first love of Christians, resulting in 
the awakening and conversion of sinners to God. In the pop- 
ular sense, a revival of religion in a community is the arous- 
ing, quickening, and reclaiming of the more or less backslid- 
den church and the more or less general awakening of all 
classes, and insuring attention to the claims of God. 

It presupposes that the church is sunk down in a backslid- 



WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 15 

den state, and a revival consists in the return of a church from 
her backshdings, and in the conversion of sinners. 

1. A revival always includes conviction of sin on the part 
of the church- Backslidden professors cannot wake up and 
begin right away in the service of God, without deep search- 
ings of heart. The fountains of sin need to be broken up. 
In a true revival, Christians are always brought under such 
convictions ; they see their sins in such a light, that often they 
find it impossible to maintain a hope of then acceptance with 
God. It does not always go to that extent ; but there are al- 
ways, in a genuine revival, deep convictions of sin, and often 
cases of abandoning all hope. 

2. Backslidden Christians will be brought to repentance. 
A revival is nothing else than a new beginning of obedience 
to God. Just as in the case of a converted sinner, the first 
step is a deep repentance, a breaking down of heart, a getting 
down into the dust before God, with deep humility, and for- 
saking of sin. 

3. Christians will have then- faith renewed. While they 
are in their backslidden state they are blind to the state of sin- 
ners. Then- hearts are as hard as marble. The truths of the 
Bible only appear like a dream. They admit it to be all true; 
then' conscience and then judgment assent to it ; but their 
faith does not see it standing out in bold relief, in all the 
burning realities of eternity. But when they enter into a re- 
vival, they no longer see men as trees walking, but they see 
things in that strong light which will renew the love of God 
in their hearts. This will lead them to labor zealously to 
bring others to him. They will feel grieved that others do 
not love God, when they love him so much. And they will 
set themselves feelingly to persuade their neighbors to give 
him their hearts. So their love to men will be renewed. They 
will be filled with a tender and burning love for souls. They 
will have a longing desire for the salvation of the whole world. 
They will be in an agony for individuals whom they want to have 
saved — then 1 Mends, relations, enemies. They will not only 
be urging them to give then hearts to God, but they will carry 
them to God in the arms of faith, and with strong crying and 
tears beseech God to have mercy on them, and save their souls 
from endless burnings. 

4. A revival breaks the power of the world and of sin over 
Christians. It brings them* to such vantage ground that they 
get a fresh impulse towards heaven. They have a new fore- 
taste of heaven, and new desires after union with God ; and 
the charm of the world is broken, and the power of sin overcome. 



16 WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 

5. When the churches are thus awakened and reformed, 
the reformation and salvation of sinners will follow, going 
through the same stages of conviction, repentance, and refor- 
mation. Their hearts will be broken down and changed. 
Very often the most abandoned profligates are among the 
subjects. Harlots, and drunkards, and infidels, and all sorts 
of abandoned characters, are awakened and converted. The 
worst among human beings are softened, and reclaimed, and 
made to appear as lovely specimens of the beauty of holiness. 

m. I AM TO CONSIDER THE AGENCIES EMPLOYED IN CARRYING 
FORWARD A REVIVAL OF RELIGION. 

Ordinarily, there are three agents employed in the work of 
conversion, and one instrument. The agents are God, — some 
person who brings the truth to bear on the mind, — and the 
sinner himself. The instrument is the truth. There are air 
ivays two agents, God and the sinner, employed and active in 
every case of genuine conversion. 

, 1. .The agency of God is two-fold ; by his Providence and 
by his Spirit. 

(1.) By his providential government, he so arranges events 
as to bring the sinner's mind and the truth in contact. He 
brings the sinner where the truth reaches his ears or his eyes. * 
It is often interesting to trace the manner in which God ar- 
ranges events so as to bring this about, and how he some- 
times makes every thing seem to favor a revival. The state 
of the weather, and of the public health, and other circum- 
stances concur to make every thing just right to favor the ap- 
plication of truth mth the greatest possible efficacy. How 
he sometimes sends a minister along, just at the time he is 
wanted ! How he brings out a particular truth, just at the 
particular time when the individual it is fitted to reach is in 
the way to hear ! 

(2.) God's special agency by his Holy Spirit. Having di- 
rect access to the mind, and knowing infinitely well the whole 
history and state of each individual sinner, he employs that 
truth which is best adapted to his particular case, and then 
sets it home with Divine power. He gives it such vividness, 
strength, and power, that the sinner quails, and throws down 
his weapons of rebellion, and turns to the Lord. Under his 
influence, the truth burns and cuts its way like fire. He makes 
the truth stand out in such aspects, that it crushes the proud- 
est man down with the weight of a mountain. If men were 
disposed to obey God, the truth is given with sufficient clear- 



WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 17 

ness in the Bible ; and from preaching they could learn all 
that is necessary for them to know. But because they are 
wholly disinclined to obey it, God clears it up before then* 
minds, and pours in a blaze of convincing light upon their 
souls, which they cannot withstand, and they yield to it, and 
obey God, and are saved. 

2. The agency of men is commonly employed. Men are- 
not mere jptwuments in the hands of God. Truth is the in- 
strument. The preacher is a moral agent in the work ; he 
acts ; he is not a mere passive instrument ; he is voluntary in 
promoting the conversion of sinners. 

3. The agency of the sinner himself. The conversion of a 
sinner consists in his obeying the truth. It is therefore im- 
possible it should take place without his agency, for it consists 
in his acting right. He is influenced to this by the agency of 
God, and by the agency of men. Men act on their fellow-men, 
not only by language, but by their looks, their tears, their daily 
deportment. See that impenitent man there, who has a pious 
wife. Her very looks, her tenderness, her solemn, compassion- 
ate dignity, softened and moulded into the image of Christ are 
a sermon to him all the time. He has to turn his mind away, 
because it is such a reproach to him. He feels a sermon ring- 
ing in his ears all day long. 

Mankind are accustomed to read the countenances of their 
neighbors. Sinners often read the state of a Christian's niind 
in his eyes. If his eyes are full of levity, or worldly anxiety 
and contrivance, sinners read it. If they are full of the Spirit 
of God, sinners read it ; and they are often led to conviction 
by barely seeing the countenance of Christians. 

An individual once went into a manufactory to see the ma- 
chinery. His mind was solemn, as he had been where there 
was a revival. The people who labored there all knew him 
by sight, and knew who he was. A young lady who was at 
work saw him, and whispered some foolish remark to her com- 
panion, and laughed. The person stopped and looked at her 
with a feeling of grief. She stopped, her thread broke, and 
she was so much agitated she could not join it. She looked 
out at the window to compose herself, and then tried again ; 
again and again she strove to recover her self-command. At 
length she sat down, overcome with her feelings. The person 
then approached and spoke with her ; she soon manifested a 
deep sense of sin. The feeling spread through the establish- 
ment like fire, and in a few hours almost every person em- 
ployed there was under conviction, so much so, that the 
* owner, though a worldly man, was astounded, and requested 



\ 



18 WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 

to have the works stop and have a prayer meeting ; for he 
said it was a great deal more important to have these people 
converted than to have the works go on. And in a few days, 
the owner and nearly every person employed in the establish- 
ment were hopefully converted. The eye of this individual, 
his solemn countenance, his compassionate feeling, rebuked 
the levity of the young woman, and brought her under con- 
viction of sin : and this whole revival followed, probably in a 
great measure, from so small an incident. 

If Christians have deep feeling on the subject of religion 
themselves, they will produce deep feeling wherever they go. 
And if they are cold, or light and trifling, they inevitably de- 
stroy all deep feeling, even in awakened sinners. 

I knew a case, once, of an individual who was very anxious, 
but one day I was grieved to find that her convictions seeded 
to be all gone. I asked her what she had been doing. She 
told me she had been spending the afternoon at such a place, 
among some professors of religion, not thinking that it would 
dissipate her convictions to spend an afternoon with profess- 
'ors of religion. But they were trifling and vain, and thus 
her convictions were lost. And no doubt those professors of 
religion, by their folly, destroyed a soul, for her convictions 
did not return. 

The church is required to use the means for the conversion 
of sinners. Sinners cannot properly be said to use the means 
for their own conversion. The church uses the means. What 
sinners do is to submit to the truth, or to resist it. It is a 
mistake of sinners, to think they are using means for their 
own conversion. The whole drift of a revival, and every thing 
about it, is designed to present the truth to your mind, for 
your obedience or resistance. 

REilARKS. 

1. Eevivals were formerly regarded as miracles. And it 
has been so by some even in our day. And others have ideas 
on the subject so loose and unsatisfactory, that if they would 
only think, they would see their absurdity. For a long time, 
it was supposed by the church, that a revival was a miracle, 
an interposition of Divine power which they had nothing to 
do with, and which they had no more agency in producing, 
than they had in producing thunder, or a storm of hail, or 
an earthquake. It is only within a few years that ministers 
generally have supposed revivals were to be promoted, by the 
use of means designed and adapted specially to that object, « 



WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 19 

Even in New England, it has been supposed that revivals came 
just as showers do, sometimes in one town, and sometimes in 
another, and that ministers and churches could do nothing 
more to produce them than they could to make showers of 
rain come on their own town, when they were falling on a neigh- 
boring town. 

It used to be supposed that a revival would come about 
once in fifteen years, and all would be converted that God in- 
tended to save, and then they must wait until another crop 
came forward on the stage of life. Finally, the time got short- 
ened down to five years, and they supposed there might be a 
revival about as often as that. 

I have heard a fact in relation to one of these pastors, who 
supposed revivals might come about once in five years. There 
had been a revival in his congregation. The next year, there 
was a revival in a neighboring town, and he went there to 
preach, and staid several days, till he got his soul all engaged 
in the work He returned home on Saturday, and went into 
his study to prepare for the Sabbath. And his soul was in an 
agony. He thought how many adult persons there were in 
his congregation at enmity with God — so many still unconver- 
ted — so many persons die yearly — such a portion of them un- 
converted — if a revival does not come under five years, so 
many adult heads of families will be in hell. He put down 
his calculations on paper, and embodied them in his sermon 
for the next day, with his heart bleeding at the dreadful pic- 
ture. As I understood it, he did not do this with any expec- 
tation of a revival, but he felt deeply, and poured out his heart 
to his people. And that sermon awakened/br^ heads of fam- 
ilies, and a powerful revival followed ; and so his theory about 
a revival once in five years was all exploded. 

Thus God has overthrown, generally, the theory that revi- 
vals are miracles. 

2. Mistaken notions concerning the sovereignty of God have 
greatly hindered revivals. 

Many people have supposed God's sovereignty to be some- 
thing very different from what it is. They have supposed it to 
be such an arbitrary disposal of events, and particularly of 
the gift of his Spirit, as precluded a rational employment of 
means for promoting a revival of religion. But there is no 
evidence from the Bible that God exercises any such sover- 
eignty as that. There are no facts to prove it. But every- 
thing goes to show that God has connected means with the 
end through all the departments of his government — in nature 
and in grace. There is no natural event in which his own 



20 WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 

agency is not concerned. He has not built the creation like 
a vast machine that will go on alone without his further care. 
He has not retired from the universe, to let it work for itself. 
This is mere atheism. He exercises a universal superintend- 
ence and control. And yet every event in nature has been 
brought about by means. He neither administers providence 
nor grace with that sort of sovereignty that dispenses with 
the use of means. There is no more sovereignty in one than 
in the other. 

And yet some people are terribly alarmed at all direct efforts 
to promote a revival, and they cry out, " You are trying to 
get up a revival in your own strength. Take care, you are in- 
terfering with the sovereignty of God. Better keep along in 
the usual course, and let God give a revival when he thinks it 
is best. God is a sovereign, and it is very wrong for you to 
attempt to get up a revival, just because you think a revival is 
needed." This is just such preaching as the devil wants. And 
men cannot do the devil's work more effectually than by 
preaching up the sovereignty of God, as a reason why we 
should not put forth efforts to produce a revival. 

3. You see the error of those who are beginning to think 
that religion can be better promoted in the world without re- 
vivals, and who are disposed to give up all efforts to produce 
religious awakenings. Because there are evils arising in some 
instances out of great excitements on the subject of religion, 
they are of opinion that it is best to dispense with them alto- 
gether. This cannot, and must not be. True, there is dan- 
ger of abuses. In cases of great religious as well as all other 
excitements, more or less incidental evils may be expected of 
course. But this is no reason why they should be given up. 
The best things are always liable to abuses. Great and man- 
ifold evils have originated in the providential and moral gov- 
ernments of God. But these foreseen perversions and evils 
were not considered a sufficient reason for giving them up. 
For the establishment of these governments was on the whole 
the best that could be done for the production of the greatest 
amount of happiness. So in revivals of religion, it is found 
by experience, that in the present state of the world, religion 
cannot be promoted to any considerable extent without them. 
The evils which are sometimes complained of, when they are 
real, are incidental, and of small importance when compared 
with the amount of good produced by revivals. The senti- 
ment should not be admitted by the church for a moment, 
that revivals* may be given up. It is fraught with all that is 
dangerous to the interests of Zion, is death to the cause of 



WHAT A REVIVAL OF RELIGION IS. 21 

missions, and brings in its train the damnation of the 
world. 

Finally.— I have a proposal to make to you who are here 
present. I have not commenced this course of Lectures on 
Revivals to get up a curious theory of my own on the sub- 
ject. I would not spend my time and strength merely to 
give you instructions, to gratify your curiosity, and furnish 
you something to talk about. I have no idea of preaching 
about revivals. It is not my design to preach so as to have 
you able to say at the close, "We understand all about revi- 
vals now," while you do nothing. But I wish to ask you a 
question. What do you hear lectures on revivals for ? Do 
you mean that whenever you are convinced what your duty 
is in promoting a revival, you will go to work and practise it ? 

Will you follow the instructions I shall give you from the 
Word of God, and put them in practise in your own lives ? 
Will you bring them to bear upon your families, your acquain- 
tance, neighbors, and through the city ? Or mil you spend 
the winter in learning about revivals, and do nothing for them ? 
I want you, as fast as you learn any thing on the subject of 
revivals, to put it in practice, and go to work and see if you 
cannot promote a revival among sinners here. If you will 
not do this, I wish you to let me know at the beginning, so 
that I need not waste my strength. You ought to decide now 
whether you will do this or not. You know that we call sin- 
ners to decide on the spot whether they will obey the Gospel. 
And we have no more authority to let you take time to delib- 
erate whether you will obey God, than we have to let sinners 
do so. We call on you to unite now in a solemn pledge to 
God, that you will do your duty as fast as you learn what it 
is, and to pray that He will pour out his Spirit upon this church 
and upon all the city this winter. 



LECTUBE II. 

WHEN A BEVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 

Text.— Wilt thou not revive us again; that thy people may rejoice in thee?— 
Psalm lxxxv. 6. 

This Psalm seems to have been written soon after the re- 
turn of the people of Israel from the Babylonish captivity ; 
as you will easily see from the language at the commence- 
ment of it. The Psalmist felt that God had been very fa- 
vorable to the people, and while contemplating the goodness 
of the Lord in bringing them back from the land where they 
had been carried away captive, and while looking at the pros- 
pects before them, he breaks out into a prayer for a Bevival 
of Beligion. " Wilt thou not revive us again, that thy peo- 
ple may rejoice in thee ? " Since God in his providence had 
re-established the ordinances of his house among them, he 
prays that there may be also a revival of religion, to crown 
the work. 

Last Friday evening I attempted to show what a Bevival of 
Beligion is not ; what a Bevival is ; and the agencies to be 
employed in promoting it. The topics to which I wish to call 
your attention to-night, are, 

I. When a Bevival of Beligion is needed. 
II. The importance of a Bevival when it is needed,, 

IH. When a Bevival of Beligion may be expected. 

I. WHEN IS A EEVIVAL OF RELIGION NEEDED? 

1. When there is a want of brotherly love and Christian 
confidence among professors of religion, then a revival is need- 
ed. Then there is a loud call for God to revive his work. 
When Christians have sunk down into- a low and backslidden 
state, they neither have, nor ought to have, nor is there rea- 
son to have, the same love and confidence toward each other, 
as when they are all alive, and active, and living holy lives. 
The love of benevolence may be the same, but not the love of 
complacency. God loves all men with the love of benevo- 
lence, but he does not feel the love of complacency toward 
any but those who live holy. Christians do not and cannot 
love each other with the love of complacency, only in propor- 
(22) 



WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 23 

tion to their holiness. If Christian love is the love of the im- 
age of Christ in his people, then it never can be exercised only 
where that image really or apparently exists. A person must 
reflect the image of Christ, and show the spirit of Christ, be- 
fore other Christians can love him with the love of complacen- 
cy. It is in vain to call on Christians to love one another with 
the love of complacency, as Christians, when they are sunk 
down in stupidity. They see nothing in each other to produce 
this love. It is next to impossible that they should feel other- 
wise toward each other, than they do toward sinners. Merely 
knowing that they belong to the church, or seeing them occa- 
sionally at the communion table, will not produce Christian 
love, unless they see the image of Christ. 

2. "When there are dissensions, and jealousies, and evil 
speakings among professors of religion, then there is great 
need of a revival. These things show that Christians have 
got far from God, and it is time to think earnestly of a revival. 
Religion cannot prosper with such things in the church, and 
nothing can put an end to them like a revival. 

3. When there is a worldly spirit in the church. It is man- 
ifest that the church is sunk down into a low and backslidden 
state, when you see Christians conform to the world in dress, 
equipage, parties, seeking worldly amusements, reading nov- 
els, and other books such as the world read. It shows that 
they are far from God, and that there is great need of a Revi- 
val of Religion. 

4. When the church finds its members falling into gross and 
scandalous sins, then it is time for the church to awake and 
cry to God for a Revival of Religion. WTien such things aro 
taking place, as give the enemies of religion an occasion for 
reproach, it is time for the church to ask of God, " WHiat will 
become of thy great name ? " 

5. When there is a spirit of controversy in the church or in 
the land, a revival is needful. The spirit, of religion is not the 
spirit of controversy. There can be no prosperity in religion, 
where the spirit of controversy prevails. 

6. WThen the wicked triumph over the church, and revile 
them, it is time to seek for a Revival of Religion. 

7. WThen sinners are careless and stupid, and sinking into 
hell unconcerned, it is time the church should bestir themselves. 
It is as much the duty of the church to awake, as it is of the 
firemen to awake when a fire breaks out in the night in a great 
city. The church ought to put out the fires of hell which are 
laying hold of the wicked. Sleep ! Should the firemen sleep, 
and let the whole city burn down ; what would be thought of 



24 WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 

such firemen ? And yet their guilt would not compare with 
the guilt of Christians who sleep while sinners around them 
are sinking stupid into the fires of hell. 

H. I AM TO SHOW THE IMPORTANCE OF A REVIVAL OF RELIGION 
IN SUCH CIRCUMSTANCES. 

1. A Revival of Religion is the only possible thing that can 
wipe away the reproach which covers the church, and restore 
religion to the place it ought to have in the estimation of the 
public. Without a revival, this reproach will cover the church 
more and more, until it is overwhelmed with universal con- 
tempt. You may do any thing else you please, and you can 
change the aspects of society in some respects, but you will 
do no real good ; you only make it worse without a Revival 
of Religion. You may go and build a splendid new house of 
worship, and line your seats with damask, put up a costly pul- 
pit, and get a magnificent organ, and every thing of that kind, 
to make a show and dash, and in that way you may procure 
a sort of respect for religion among the wicked, but it does 
no good in reality. It rather does hurt. It misleads them as 
to the real nature of religion ; and so far from converting 
them, it carries them farther away from salvation. Look 
wherever they have surrounded the altar of Christianity 
with splendor, and you will find that the impression produc- 
ed is contrary to the true nature of religion. There must 
be a waking up of energy, on the part of Christians, and an 
outpouring of God's Spirit, or the world will laugh at the 
church. 

2. Nothing else will restore Christian love and confidence 
among church members. Nothing but a Revival of Religion 
can restore it, and nothing else ought to restore it. There is 
no other way to wake up that love of Christians for one an- 
other, which is sometimes felt, when they have such love as 
they cannot express. You cannot have such love without con- 
fidence ; and you cannot restore confidence without such evi- 
dence of piety as is seen in a revival. If a minister finds he 
has lost in any degree the confidence of his people, he ought 
to labor for a revival as the only means of regaining their 
confidence. I do not mean that this should be his motive in 
laboring for a revival, to regain the confidence of his people, 
but that a revival through his instrumentality, and ordinar- 
ily nothing else, will restore to him the confidence of the 
praying part of his people. So if an elder or private mem- 
ber of the church finds his brethren cold towards him, there 



WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 25 

is but one way to remedy it. It is by being revived himself, 
and pouring out from his eyes and from his life the splendor 
of .the image of Christ. This spirit will catch and spread in 
the church, and confidence will be renewed, and brotherly love 
prevail again. 

3. At such a time a Revival of Religion is indispensable to 
avert the judgments of God from the church. This would 
be strange preaching, if revivals are only miracles, and if the 
church has no more agency in producing them, than it has in 
making a thunder storm. To say to the church, that unless 
there is a revival you may expect judgments, would then be 
as ridiculous as to say, If you do not have a thunder storm, 
you may expect judgments. The fact is, that Christians, are 
more to blame for not being revived, than sinners are for not 
being converted. And if they are not awakened, they may 
know assuredly that God will visit them with his judgments. 
How often God visited- the Jewish church with judgments, 
because they would not repent and be revived at the call of 
his prophets! How often have we seen churches, and even 
whole denominations, cursed with a corse, because they would 
not wake up and seek the Lord, and pray, ." Wilt thou not 
revive us again, that thy people may rejoice in thee ? M 

4. Nothing but a Revival of Religion can preserve such a 
church from, annihilation. A church declining in this way 
cannot continue to exist without a revival. If it receives new 
members, they will, for the most part, be made up of ungodly 
persons, Without revivals there will not ordinarily be as 
many persons converted as will die off in a year. There 
have been churches in this country where the members have 
died offj and there were no revivals to convert others in then 1 
place, till the church has ran out, and the organization has 
been dissolved. 

A minister told me that he once labored as a missionary in 
Vmginia, on the ground where such a man as Samuel Davies 
once flashed and shone like a flaming torch; and that Davies's 
church was so reduced as to have but one male member, and 
he, if I remember light, was a colored man. The church had 
got proud, and was all ran out. I have heard of a church in 
Pennsylvania, that was formerly flourishing, but neglected re- 
vivals, and it became so reduced that the pastor had to send 
to a neighboring church for a ruling elder when he adminis- 
tered the communion.* 



* Why not, in such a case, let any member of the church, male or female, distri 
bate the elements f Is it indispensable to have an eMer ? 

2 



2G WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 

5. Nothing but a Revival of Religion can prevent the means 
of grace from doing a great injury to the ungodly. "Without 
a revival, they will grow harder and harder under preaching, 
and will experience a more horrible damnation than they 
would if they had never heard the Gospel. Your children and 
your friends will go down to a much more horrible fate in hell, 
in consequence of the means of grace, if there are no revivals 
to convert them to God. Better were it for them if there 
were no means of grace, no sanctuary, no Bible, no preaching, 
and if they had never heard the Gospel, than to live and die 
where there is no revival. The Gospel is the savor of death 
unto death, if it is not made a savor of life unto life. 

6. There is no other way in which a church can be sancti- 
fied, grow in grace, and be fitted for heaven. What is grow- 
ing in grace ? ^ it hearing sermons and getting some new 
notions about religion ? No — no such thing. The Christian 
who does this, and nothing more, is getting worse and worse, 
more and more hardened, and every week it is more difficult 
to rouse him up to duty. 

ITL I AM TO SHOW VTHEN A REVIVAL OF RELIGION HAT BE EX- 
PECTED. 

1. When the providence of God indicates that a revival is 
at hand. The indications of God's providence are sometimes 
so plain as to amount to a revelation of his will. There is a 
conspiring of events to open the way, a preparation of cir- 
cumstances to favor a revival, so that those who are looking 
out can see that a revival is at hand, just as plainly as if it had 
been revealed from Heaven. Cases have occurred in this 
country, where the providential manifestations were so plain, 
that those who are careful observers, felt no hesitation in say- 
ing that God was coming to pour out his Spirit, and grant a 
revival of religion. There are various ways for God to indi- 
cate his will to a people — sometimes by giving them peculiar 
means, sometimes by peculiar and alarming events, sometimes 
by remarkably favoring the employment of means, by the 
weather, health, etc. 

2. When the wickedness of the wicked grieves and hum- 
bles and distresses Christians. Sometimes Christians do not 
seem to mind any thing about the wickedness around them. 
Or if they talk about it, it is in a cold, and callous, and unfeel- 
ing way, as if they despaired of a reformation : they are dis- 
posed to scold at sinners — not to feel the compassion of the 
Son of God for them. But sometimes the conduct of the 



WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 27 

wicked drives Christians to prayer, and breaks them down, 
and makes them sorrowful and tender-hearted, so that they 
can weep day and jiight, and instead of scolding and reproach- 
ing them, they pray earnestly for them. Then you may ex- 
pect a revival. Indeed this is a revival begun already. Some- 
times the wicked will get up an opposition to religion. And 
when this drives Christians to their knees in prayer to God, 
with strong crying and tears, you may be certain there is 
going to be a revival. The prevalence of wickedness is no 
evidence at all that there is not going to be a revival. That 
is often God's time to work. When the enemy cometh in 
like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord lifts up a standard against 
him. Often the first indication of a revival, is the devil's get- 
ting up something new in opposition. In will invariably have 
one of two effects. It will either drive Christians to God, or 
it will drive them farther away from God, to some carnal pol- 
icy or other that will only make things worse. Frequently 
the most outrageous wickedness of the ungodly is followed 
by a revival. If Christians are made to feel that they have 
no hope but in God, and if they have sufficient feeling left to 
care for the honor of God and the salvation of the souls of 
the impenitent, there will certainly be a revival. Let hell 
boil over if it will, and spew out as many devils as there are 
stones in the pavements, if it only drives Christians to God 
in prayer — they cannot hinder a revival. Let Satan get up a 
row, and sound his horn as loud as he pleases ; if Christians 
will only be humbled and pray, they shall soon see God's 
naked arm in a revival of religion. I have known instances 
where a revival has broken in upon the ranks of the enemy, 
almost as suddenly as a clap of thunder, and scattered them — 
taken the very ringleaders as trophies, and broken up their 
party in an instant. 

3. A revival may be expected when Christians have a spirit 
of prayer for a revival. That is, when they pray as if their 
hearts were set upon a revival. Sometimes Christians are 
not engaged in prayer for a revival, not even when they are 
warm in prayer. Their minds are upon something else ; they 
are praying for something els£ — the salvation of the heathen 
and the like — and riot for a revival among themselves. But 
when they feel the want of a revival, they pray for it ; they 
feel for their own families and neighborhoods, and pray for 
them as if they could not be denied. What constitutes a 
spirit of prayer ? Is it many prayers and warm words ? No. 
Prayer is the state of the heart. The spirit of prayer is a 
state of continual desire and anxiety of mind for the salvation 



28 WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 

of sinners. It is something that weighs them down. It is 
the same, so far as the philosophy of the mind is concerned, 
as when a man is anxious for some worldly.interest. A Chris- 
tian who has this spirit of prayer feels anxious for souls. It 
is the subject of his thoughts all the time, and makes him 
look and act as if he had a load on his mind. He thinks of 
it by day, and dreams of it by night. This is properly pray- 
ing without ceasing. The man's prayers seem to flow from 
his heart liquid as water — " O Lord, revive thy work." Some- 
times this feeling is very deep ; persons have been bowed 
down, so that they could neither stand nor sit. I can name 
men in this State, of firm nerves, who stand high in charac- 
ter, who have been absolutely crushed with grief for the state 
of sinners. They have had an actual travail of soul for sin- 
ners, till they were as helpless as children. The feeling is 
not always so great as this, but such things are much more 
common than is supposed. In the great revivals in 1826, they 
were common. This is by no means enthusiasm. It is just 
what Paul felt, when he says, " My little children, of whom I 
travail in birth." I heard of a person in this State, who prayed 
for sinners, and finally got into such a state of mind, that she 
could not live without prayer. She could not rest day nor 
night, unless there was somebody praying. Then she would 
be at ease ; but if they ceased, she would shriek in agony till 
there was prayer again. And this continued for two days, 
until she prevailed in prayer, and her soul was relieved. This 
travail of soul, is that deep agony, which persons feel when 
they lay hold on God for such a blessing, and will not let him 
go till they receive it. I do not mean to be understood that 
it is essential to a spirit of prayer, that the distress should be 
so great as this. But this deep, continual, earnest desire for 
the salvation of sinners, is what constitutes the spirit of pray- 
er for a revival. It is a revival begun so far as this spirit of 
prayer extends. 

When this feeling exists in a church, unless the Spirit is 
grieved away by sin, there will infallibly be a revival of 
Christians generally, and it will involve the conversion of sin- 
ners to God. This anxiety and distress increases till the 

revival commences. A clergyman in W : n told me of a 

revival among his people, which commenced with a zealous 
and devoted woman in the church. She became anxious 
about sinners, and went to praying for them ; she prayed 
and her distress increased ; and she finally came to her 
minister, and talked with him, and asked him to appoint an 
anxious meeting, for she felt that one was needed. The min- 



WHEN A KEVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 29 

ister put her off, for he felt nothing of it. The next week she 
came again, and besought him to appoint an anxious meet- 
ing ; she knew there would be somebody to come, for she felt 
as if God was going to pour out his Spirit He put her off 
again. And finally she said to him, "If you do not appoint 
an anxious meeting I shall die, for there is certainly going to 
be a revival." The next Sabbath he appointed a meeting. 
and said that if there were any who wished to converse with 
him about the salvation of their souls, he would meet them 
on such an evening. He did not know of one, but when he 
went to the place, to his astonishment he found a large num- 
ber of anxious inquirers. Now do not you think that woman 
knew there was going to be a revival? Call it what you 
please, a new revelation, or an old revelation, or any thing 
else. I say it was the Spirit of God that taught that praying 
woman there was going to be a revival. " The secret of the 
Lord" was with her, and she knew it. She knew God had 
been in her heart, and filled it so full that she could contain 
no longer. 

Sometimes ministers have had this distress about then- con- 
gregations, so that they felt as if they cculd not live unless 
they could see a revival Sometimes elders and deacons, or 
private members of the church, men or women, have the spirit 
of prayer for a revival of religion, so that they will hold on 
and prevail with God, till he pours out his Spirit. The first 
ray of light that broke in upon the midnight which rested on 
the churches in Oneida county, in the fall of 1825, was from 
a woman in feeble health, who, I believe, had never been in a 
powerful revival. Her soul was exercised about sinners. 
She was in an agony for the land. She did not know what 
ailed her, but she kept praying more and more., till it seemed 
as if her agony would destroy her body. At length she 
became full of joy, and exclaimed, "God has come! God 
has come ! There is no mistake about it, the work is begun, 
and is going over all the region." And sure enough, the 
work began, and her family were almost all converted, and 
the work spread all over that part of the country. Now, do 
you think that woman was deceived ? I tell you, no. She 
knew she had prevailed with God in prayer. She had trav- 
ailed in birth for souls, and she knew it. This was not the 
only instance, by many, that I knew in that region. 

Generally, there are but few professors of religion that 
know any thing about this spirit of prayer which prevails 
with God. I have been amazed to see such accounts as are 
often published about revivals, as if the revival had come 



30 WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 

without any cause — nobody knew why or wherefore. I have 
sometimes inquired into such cases ; when it had been given 
out that nobody knew any thing about it until one Sabbath 
they saw in the face of the congregation that God was there, 
or they saw it in their conference room, or prayer meeting, 
and were astonished at the mysterious sovereignty of God, in 
bringing in a revival without any apparent connection with 
means. Now mark me. Go and inquire among the obscure 
members of the church, and you will always find that some- 
body had been praying for a revival, and was expecting it — 
some man or woman had been agonizing in prayer, for the 
salvation of sinners, until they gained the blessing. It may 
have found the minister and the body of the church fast 
asleep, and they would wake up all of a sudden, like a man 
just rubbing his eyes open, and running round the room 
pushing things over, and wondering where all this excitement 
came from. But though few knew it, you may be sure there 
has been somebody on the watch-tower ; constant in prayer 
till the blessing came. Generally, a revival is more or less 
extensive, as there are more or less persons who have the 
spirit of prayer. But I will not dwell on this subject any far- 
ther at present, as the subject of prayer will come up again in 
this course of lectures. 

4 Another sign that a revival may be expected, is when 
the attention of ministers is especially directed to this partic- 
ular object, and when their preaching and other efforts are 
aimed particularly at the conversion of sinners. Most of the 
time the labors of ministers are, it would seem, directed to 
other objects. They seem to preach and labor with no par- 
ticular design to effect the immediate conversion of sinners. 
And then it need not be expected that there will be a revival 
under their preaching. There never will be a revival till 
somebody makes particular efforts for this end. But when the 
attention of a minister is directed to the state of the families 
in his congregation, and his heart is full of feeling of the ne- 
cessity of a revival, and when he puts forth the proper efforts 
for this end, then you may be prepared to expect a revival. 
As I explained last week, the connection between the right 
use of means for a revival, and a revival, is as philosophically 
sure as between the right use of means to raise grain, and a 
crop of wheat. I believe, in fact, it is more certain, and that 
there are fewer instances of failure. The effect is more cer- 
tain to follow. The paramount importance of spiritual 
things makes it reasonable that it should be so. Take the 
Bible, the nature of the case, and the history of the church, 



WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 31 

all together, and you will find fewer failures in the use of 
means for a revival, than in farming, or any other worldly 
business. In worldly business there are sometimes cases 
where counteracting causes annihilate all a man can do. In 
raising grain, for instance, there are cases which are beyond 
the control of man, such as drought, hard winter, worms, and 
so on. So in laboring to promote a revival, there may 
things occur to counteract it, something or other turning up 
to divert the public attention from religion, which may baffle 
every effort. But I believe there are fewer such cases in the 
moral than in the natural world. I have seldom seen an in- 
dividual fail, when he used the means for promoting a revival 
in earnest,. in the manner pointed out in the word of God. I 
believe a man may enter on the work of promoting a revival, 
with as reasonable an expectation of success, as he can enter 
on any other work with an expectation of success ; with the 
same expectation as the farmer has of a crop when he sows 
his grain. I have sometimes seen this tried and succeed un- 
der circumstances the most forbidding that can be conceived. 

The great revival in Rochester began under the most dis- 
advantageous circumstances that could well be imagined. 
It seemed as though Satan had interposed every possible ob- 
stacle to a revival. The three churches were at variance; one 
had no minister, one was divided and about to dismiss their 
minister. An elder of the third Presbyterian church had 
brought a charge of unchristian conduct against the pastor 
of the first church, and they were just going to have a trial 
before the presbytery. After the work began, one of the first 
things was, the great stone church gave way, and created a 
panic. Then one of the churches went on and dismissed 
their minister right in the midst of it. Another church 
nearly broke down. Many other things occurred, so that 
it seemed as if the devil was determined to divert the public 
attention from the subject of religion. But there were a few 
remarkable cases of the spirit of prayer, which assured us 
that God was there, and we went on : and the more Satan 
opposed, the Spirit of the Lord lifted up the standard higher 
and higher, tin finally a wave of salvation rolled over the 
place. 

5. A revival of religion may be expected when Christians 
begin to confess their sins to one another. At other times, 
they confess in a general manner, as if they were only half in 
earnest. They may do it in eloquent language, but it does 
not mean any thing. But when there is an ingenuous break- 
ing down, and a pouring out of the heart in making a con- 



32 WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 

fession of their sins, the flood-gates will soon burst open, and 
salvation will flow over the place. 

6. A revival may be expected whenever Christians are 
found willing to make the sacrifice necessary to carry it on. 
They must be willing to sacrifice their feelings, their business, 
their time, to help forward the work. Ministers must be 
willing to lay out their strength, and to jeopard their 
health and life. They must be willing to offend the im- 
penitent by plain and faithful dealing, and perhaps offend 
many members of the church who will not come up to the 
work. They must take a decided stand with the revival, 
be the consequences what they may. They must be pre- 
pared to go on with the work, even though they should lose 
the affections of all the impenitent, and of all the cold part 
of the church. The minister must be prepared, if it is the 
will of God, to be driven away from the place. He must be 
determined to go straight forward, and leave the entire event 
with God. 

I knew a minister who had a young man laboring with him 
in a revival. The young man preached pretty plain, and the 
wicked did not like him. They said, "We like our minister, 
and we wish to have him preach. They finally said so much 
that the minister told the young man, " Mr. Such-a-one, that 
gives so much towards my support, says so and so. Hr. A. 
says so, and Mr. B. says so. They think it will break up the 
society if you continue to preach, and I think you had better 
not preach any more." The young man went away, but the 
Spirit of God immediately withdrew from the place, and the 
revival stopped short. The minister, by yielding to the wicked 
desires of the wicked, drove him away. He was afraid the 
devil would drive him away from his people, and by undertak- 
ing to satisfy the devil, he offended God. And God so ordered 
events, that in a short time he had to leave his people after 
all. He undertook to go between the devil and God, and God 
dismissed him. 

The people, also, must be willing to have a revival, let the 
sacrifice be what it may. It will not do for them to say, " We 
are willing to attend so many meetings, but we cannot attend 
any more." Or, "We are willing to have a revival if it will 
not disturb our arrangements about our business, or prevent 
our making money." I tell you, such people will never have 
a revival, till they are willing to do any thing, and sacrifice 
any thing, that God indicates to be their duty. Christian 
merchants must feel willing to lock up their stores for six 
months, if it is necessary to carry on a revival. I do not 



WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 33 

mean to say any such thing is called for, or that it is their 
duty to do so. But if there should be such a state of feeling 
as to call for it, then it would be their duty, and they ought 
to be willing to do it. They ought to be willing to do it if 
God calls, and he can easily burn down their stores if they 
do not. In fact, I should not be sorry to see such a revival 
in New York, as would make every merchant in the city lock 
up his store till spring, and say he had sold goods enough, and 
now he would give up his whole time to lead sinners to Christ. 

7. A revival may be expected when ministers and profes- 
sors are willing to have God promote it by what instruments 
he pleases. Sometimes ministers are not willing to have a 
revival unless they can have the mangement of it, or unless 
their agency can be conspicuous in promoting it. They wish 
to prescribe to God what he shall direct and bless, and what 
men he shall put forward. They will have no new measures. 
They cannot have any of this new-light preaching, or of these 
evangelists that go about the country preaching. They have 
a great deal to say about God's being a sovereign, and that 
he will have revivals come in his own way and time. But 
then he must choose to have it just in their way, or they will 
have nothing to do with it. Such men will sleep on till they 
are awakened by the judgment trumpet, without a revival, 
unless they are willing that God should come in his own way 
— unless they are willing to have any thing or any body em- 
ployed, that will do the most good. 

8. Strictly I should say that when the foregoing things oc- 
cur, a revival, to the same extent, already exists. . In truth a 
revival should be expected whenever it is needed. If we need 
to be revived it is our duty to be revived. If it is duty it is 
possible, and we should set about being revived ourselves, 
and, relying on the promise of Christ to be with us in making 
disciples always and everywhere, we ought to labor to revive 
Christians and convert sinners, with confident expectation of • 
success. Therefore, whenever the church needs reviving they 
ought and may expect to be revived, and to see sinners con- 
verted to Christ. "When those things are seen which are 
named under the foregoing heads, let Christians and minis- 
ters be encouraged and know that a good work is already be- 
gun. Follow it up. 



KEMABKS. 

1. Brethren, you can tell from our subject, whether you 
need a revival here or not, in this church, and in this city ; 

2* 



34 WHEN A REVIVAL IS TO BE EXPECTED. 

and whether you are going to have one or not. Elders of 
the church, men, women, any of you, and all of you — what do 
you say ? 

Do you need a revival here ? 

Do you expect to have one ? 

Have you any reason to expect one ? 

You need not make any mist about it ; for you know, or 
can know if you will, whether you have any reason to look 
for a revival here. 

2. You see why you have not a revival. It is only because 
you do not want one. Because you are not praying for it ; 
nor anxious for it, nor putting forth efforts for it. I appeal 
to your own consciences. Are you making these efforts now, 
to promote a revival ? You know, brethren, what the truth 
is about it. Will you stand up and say that you have made 
the efforts for a revival and been disappointed — that you have 
cried to God, "Wilt thou not revive us ?" and God would not 
do it? 

3. Do you wish for a revival ? Will you have one ? If God 
should ask you this moment, by an audible voice from heaven. 
" Do you want a revival ?" would you dare to say, Yes ? " Are 
you willing to make the sacrifices ?" would you answer, Yes ? 
" When shall it begin ?" would you answer, Let it begin to- 
night — let it begin here — let it begin in my heart NOW? 
Would you dare to say so to God, if you should hear his voice 
to-night ? 



LEGTUKE III. 



HOW TO PEOMOTE A REVIVAL. 



Text.— Break up your fallow ground ; for it is time to seek the Lord, till lie come 
and rain righteousness upon you.— Hose a x. 12. 

The Jews were a nation of farmers, and it is therefore a 
common thing in the Scriptures to refer for illustrations to 
their occupation, and to the scenes with which farmers and 
shepherds are familiar. The prophet Hosea addresses them 
as a nation of backsliders, and reproves them for their idola- 
try, and threatens them with the judgments of God. I have 
showed you in my first lecture what a revival is not — what it 
is — and the agencies to be employed in promoting it ; and in 
my second, when it is needed — its importance — and when it 
may be expected. My design in this lecture is to show, 

HOW A REVIVAL IS TO BE PROMOTED. 

A revival consists of two parts ; as it respects the church, 
and as it respects the ungodly. I shall speak to-night of a 
revival in the church. Fallow ground is ground which has 
once been tilled, but which now lies waste, and needs to be 
broken up and mellowed, before it is suited to receive grain. 
I shall show, as it respects a revival in the church, 

1. What it is to break up the fallow ground, in the sense 
of the text. 

2. How it is to be performed. 

L WHAT IS IT TO BBEAK UP THE FALLOW GEOUND ? 

To break up the fallow ground, is to break up your hearts — 
to prepare your minds to bring forth fruit unto God. The 
mind of man is often compared p the Bible to ground, and 
the word of God to seed sown in it a and the fruit represents 
the actions and affections of those who receive it. To break 
up the fallow ground^ therefore, is to bring the mind into 
such a state, that it is fitted to receive the word of God. 
Sometimes your hearts get matted down hard and dry, and 
all run to wa^te, till there is no such thing as getting fruit 
fron\ them till they are all broken up, and mellowed down, and 
fitted to, receive the word of God. It is this sqfte&i&g' o| the 



36 HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL. 

heart, so as to make it feel the truth, which the prophet calls 
breaking up your fallow ground. 

n. HOW IS THE FALLOW GROUND TO BE BROKEN UP? 

1. It is not by any direct efforts to feel. People run into a 
mistake on this subject, from not making the laws of mind 
the object of thought. There are great errors on the subject 
of the laws which govern the mind. People talk about religi- 
ous feeling, as if they thought they could, by direct effort, call 
forth religious affection. But this is not the way the mind 
acts. No man can make himself feel in this way, merely by 
trying to feel. The feelings of the mind are not directly under 
our control. We cannot by willing, or by direct volition, call 
forth religious feelings. "We might as well think to call 
spirits up from the deep. They are purely involuntary states 
of mind. They naturally and necessarily exist in the mind 
under certain circumstances calculated to excite them. But 
they can be controlled indirectly. Otherwise there would be 
no moral character in our feelings, if there were not a way to 
control them. We cannot say, " Now I will feel so and so to- 
wards such an object." But we can command our attention to 
it, and look at it intently, till the involuntary affections arise. 
Let a man who is away from his family, bring them up before 
his mind, and will he not feel ? But it is not by saying to 
himself, " Now I will feel deeply for my family." A man can 
direct his attention to any object* about which he ought to 
feel and wishes to feel, and in that way he will call into ex- 
istence the proper emotions. Let a man call up his enemy 
before his mind, and his feelings of enmity will rise. So if a 
man thinks of God, and fastens his mind on any parts of 
God's character, he will feel — emotions will come up, by the 
very laws of mind. If he is a friend of God, let him contem- 
plate God as a gracious and holy being, and he will have emo- 
tions of friendship kindled up in his mind. If he is an enemy 
of God, only let him get the true character of God before his 
mind, and loolf at it, and fasten his attention on it, and his 
enmity will rise against Gqd, or he will break down and give 
his h§a,rt to God. 

If you wish to break up the fallow ground of your hearts, 
and make your minds feel on the subject of religion, you must 
go to work just as ypu would to feel on any other subject. Instead 
of keeping your thoughts on every thing else, and them ima- 
gine that by going to a f§w meetings you will get your feelings 
enlisted, go the common sense way to work, as you would on 



HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL. 37 

any other subject. It is just as easy to make your minds feel 
on the subject of religion as it is on any other subject. God 
has put these states of mind under your control. If people 
were as iinphilosophical about moving their limbs, as they are 
about regulating their emotions, you would never have got 
here to meeting to-night. 

If you mean to break the fallow ground of your hearts, 
you must begin by looking at your hearts — examine and note 
the state of your minds, and see where you are. Many never 
seem to think about this. They pay no attention to their own 
hearts, and never know whether they are doing well in reli- 
gion or not — whether they are gaining ground or going back 
— whether they are fruitful, or lying waste like the fallow 
ground. Now you must draw off your attention from other 
tilings, and look into this. Make a business of it. Do not 
be in a hurry. Examine thoroughly the state of your hearts, 
and see where you are — whether you are walking with God 
every day, or walking with the devil — whether you are serv- 
ing God or serving the devil most — whether you are under 
the dominion of the prince of darkness, or of the Lord Jesus 
Christ. 

To do all this, you must set yourselves at work to consider 
your sins. You must examine yourselves. And by this I do 
not mean, that you must stop and look directly within to 
see what is the present state of your feelings. That is the 
very way to put a stop to all feeling. This is just as 
absurd as it would be for a man to shut his eyes on the lamp, 
and try to turn his eyes inward to find out whether there was 
any image painted on the retina. The man complains that he 
does not see anything ! And why ? Because he has turned his 
eyes away from the objects of sight. The truth is, our moral 
feelings are as much an object of consciousness as our sensa- 
tions. And the way to excite theni, is to go on acting, and 
employing our minds. Then we can tell our moral feelings 
by consciousness, just as I could tell my natural feelings by 
consciousness, if I should put my hand in the fire. 

Self-examination consists in looking at your lives, in consi- 
dering your actions, in calling up the past, and learning its 
true character. Look back over your past history. Take up 
your individual sins one by one, and look at them. I do not 
mean that you should just cast a glance at your past life, and 
see that it has been full of sins, and then go to God and make 
a sort of general confession, and ask for pardon. That is not 
the way. You must take them up one by one. It will be a 
good thing to take a pen and paper, as you go over them, and 



38 HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL. 

write them down as they occur to you. Go over them as 
carefully as a merchant goes over his books ; and as often as 
a sin comes before your memory, add it to the list. General 
confessions of sin will never do. Your sins were committed 
one by one ; and as far as you can come at them, they ought 
to be reviewed and repented of one by one. Now begin ; 
and take up first what are commonly, but improperly, called 
your 

SINS OF OMISSION. 

1. Ingratitude. Take this sin, for instance, and write down 
under it all the instances you can remember, wherein you 
have received favors from God, for which you have never ex- 
ercised gratitude, How many cases can you remember? 
Some remarkable providence, some wonderful turn of events, 
that saved you from ruin. Set down the instances of God's 
goodness to you when you were in sin, before your conver- 
sion. Then the mercy of God in the circumstances of your 
conversion, for which you have never been half thankful 
enough. The numerous mercies you have received since. 
How long the catalogue of instances, where your ingratitude 
is so black that you are forced to hide your face in confusion ! 
Now go on your knees, and confess them one by one to God, 
and ask forgiveness. The very act of confession, by the laws 
of suggestion, will bring up others to your memory. Put 
down these. Go over these three or four times in this way, 
and you will find an astonishing amount of mercies, for which 
you have never thanked God. Then take another sin. Let 
it be, 

2. Want of love to God. Write that down, and go over all 
the instances you can remember, when you did not give to 
the blessed God that hearty love which you ought. 

Think how grieved and alarmed you would be, if you dis- 
covered any flagging of affection for you in your wife, hus- 
band, or children ; if you saw somebody else engrossing their 
hearts, and thoughts, and time. Perhaps, in such a case, you 
would well nigh die with a just and virtuous jealousy. Now, 
God styles himself a jealous God ; and have you not given 
your heart to other loves : played the harlot, and infinitely 
offended him ? 

3. Neglect of the Bible. Put down the cases, when for days, 
and perhaps for weeks — yea, it may be, even for months to- 
gether, you had no pleasure in God's word. Perhaps you did 
not read a chapter, or if you read it, it was in a way that was 



HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL. 39 

still more displeasing to God. Many people read over a whole 
chapter in such a way, that if they were put under oath when 
they have done, they could not tell what they have been read- 
ing. With so little attention do they read, that they cannot 
remember where they have read from morning till evening, 
unless they put in a string or turn down a leaf. This demon- 
strates that they did not lay to heart what they read, that 
they did not make it a subject of reflection. If you were 
reading a novel, or any other piece of intelligence that greatly 
interested you, would you not remember what you read last ? 
And th.e fact that you fold a leaf or put in a string, demon- 
strates that you read rather as a task, than from love or rev- 
erence for the word of God. The word of God is the rule of 
your duty. And dp you pay so little regard to it as not to 
remember what you read ? If so, no wonder that you live 
so at random, and that your religion is such a miserable 
failure. 

4. Unbelief. Instances in which you have virtually charged 
the God of truth with lying, by your unbelief of his express 
promises and declarations. God has promised to give the 
Holy "Spirit to them that ask him. Now, have you believed 
this ? Have you expected him to answer ? Have you not 
virtually said in your hearts, when you prayed for the Holy 
Spirit, " I do not believe that I shall receive it ? " If you have 
not believed nor expected you should receive the blessing, 
which God has expressly promised, you have charged him 
with lying. 

5. Neglect of prayer. Times when you omitted secret prayer, 
family prayer, and prayer meetings, or have prayed in such a 
way as more grievously to offend God, than to have neglected 
it altogether. 

6. Neglect of the means of grace. When you have suffered 
trifling excuses to prevent your attending meetings, have neg- 
lected and poured contempt upon the means of salvation, 
merely from disrelish of spiritual duties. 

7. The manner in which you have performed those duties — 
want of feeling — want of faith — worldly frame of mind— so 
that your words were nothing but the mere chattering of a 
wretch, that did not deserve that God should feel the least 
care for him. When you have fallen down upon your knees, 
and said your pi*ayers, in such an unfeeling and careless man- 
ner, that if you had been put under oath five minutes after 
you left your closet, you could not have told what you had 
been praying for. 

8. Your want of love for the souls of your fellow-men. Look 



40 HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL* 

round upon your friends and relations, and remember how 
little compassion you have felt for them. You have stood by 
and seen them going right to hell, and it seems as though 
you did not care if they did. How many days have there 
been, in which you did not make their condition the subject 
of a single fervent prayer, or even an ardent desire for their 
salvation ? 

9. Your ward of care for the heathen. Perhaps you have not 
cared enough for them to attempt to learn their condition ; 
perhaps not even to take a Missionary paper. Look at this, 
and see how much you do really care for the heathen, and set 
down honestly the real amount of your feelings for them, 
and your desire for their salvation. Measure your desire for 
their salvation by the self-denial you practise, in giving of 
your substance to send them the Gospel. Do you deny your- 
self even the hurtful superfluities of life, such as tea, coffee, 
and tobacco ? Do you retrench your style of living, and really 
subject yourself to any inconvenience to save them ? Do you 
daily pray for them in your closet ? Do you statedly attend 
the monthly concert ? Are you from month to month laying 
by something to put into the treasury of the Lord, when you 
go up to pray ? If you are not doing these things, and if 
your soul is not agonized for the poor benighted heathen, 
why are you such a hypocrite as to pretend to be a Christian ? 
Why, your profession is an insult to Jesus Christ ! * 

10. Your neglect of family duties. How you have lived be- 
fore them, how you have prayed, what an example you have 
set before them. What direct efforts do you habitually make 
for their spiritual good ? What duty have you not neglected ? 

11. Neglect of social duties. 

12. Neglect of watchfulness over your own life. Instances in 
which you have hurried over your private duties, and not 
taken yourself to task, nor honestly made up your accounts 
with God. Where you have entirely neglected to watch your 
conduct, and have been off your guard, and have sinned be- 
fore the world, and before the church, and before God. 

13. Neglect to watch over your brethren. How often have you 
broken your covenant, ,that you would watch over them in 
the Lord ! How little do you know or care about the state 
of their souls ! And yet you are under a solemn oath to watch 
over them. What have you done to make yourself acquainted 
with them ? How many of them have you interested yourself 
for, to know their spiritual state ? Go over the list, and wher- 
ever you find there has been a neglect, write it down. How 
many times have you seen your brethren growing cold in reli- 



HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL. 41 

gion, and have not spoken to them about it ? You have seen 
them beginning to neglect one duty after another, and you did 
not reprove them in a brotherly way. You have seen them 
falling into sin, and you let them go on. And yet you pretend 
to love them. What a hypocrite ! Would you see your wife 
or child going into disgrace, or into the fire, and hold your 
peace ? No, you would not. What do you think of yourself, 
then, to pretend to love Christians, and to love Christ, while 
you can see them going into disgrace, and say nothing to 
them? 

14. Neglect of self-denial. There are many professors who 
are willing to do almost any thing in religion, that does not 
require self-denial. But when they are called to do any thing 
that requires them to deny themselves, Oh \ that is too much. 
They think they are doing a great deal for God, and doing 
about as much as he ought to ask in reason, if they are only 
doing what they can do about as well as not ; but they are 
not willing to deny themselves any comfort, or convenience 
whatever, for the sake of serving the Lord. They will not 
willingly suffer reproach, for the name of Christ. Nor will 
they deny themselves the luxuries of life, to save a world 
from hell. So far are they from remembering that self- 
denial is a condition qfdiscipleship, that they do not know what 
self-denial is. They never have really denied themselves a 
riband or a pin for Christ, and for the Gospel. Oh, how soon 
such professors will be in hell! Some are giving of their 
abundance, and are* giving much, and are ready to complain 
that others don't give more ; when, in truth, they do not give 
any thing that they need, any thing that they could enjoy, if 
they kept it. They only give of their surplus wealth ; and 
perhaps that poor woman, who puts in twelve and a-half 
cents at the monthly concert, has exercised more self-denial, 
than they have in giving thousands. 

From these we turn to 



SINS OF COMMISSION. 

1. Worldly mindednsss. What has been the state of your 
heart in regard to your worldly possessions? Have you 
looked at them as really yours — as rf you had a right to dis- 
pose of them as your own, according to your own will ? If 
you have, write that down. If you have loved property, and 
sought after it for its own sake, or to gratify lust or ambition, 
or a worldly spirit, or to lay it up for your families, you have 
sinned, and mast repent. 



42 HOW TO PROMOTE A. REVIVAL. 

2. Pride. Recollect all the instances you can, in which 
you have detected yourself in the exercise of pride. Vanity 
is a particular form of pride. How many times have you de- 
tected yourself in consulting vanity, about your dress and ap- 
pearance? How many times have you thought more, and 
taken more pains, and spent more time, about decorating 
your body to go to church, than you have about preparing 
your mind for the worship of God ? You have gone to the 
house of God caring more how you appear outwardly in the 
sight of mortal men, than how your soul appears in the sight 
of the heart-searching God. You have in fact set up your- 
self to be worshipped by them, rather than prepared to wor- 
ship God yourself. You came to divide the worship of God's 
house, to draw off. the attention of God's people to look at 
your pretty appearance. It is in vain to pretend now, that 
you don't care any thing about having people look at you. 
Be honest about it. Would you take all this pains about 
your looks if every body was blind ? 

3. Envy. Look at the cases in which you were envious at 
those who you thought were above you in any respect. Or 
perhaps you have envied those who have been more talented 
or more useful than yourself. Have you not so envied some, 
that you have been pained to hear them praised ? It has 
been more agreeable to you to dwell upon their faults, than 
upon their virtues, upon their failures, than upon their suc- 
cess. Be honest with yourself, and if you have harbored this 
spirit of hell, repent deeply before God, dr lie will never for- 
give you. 

4. Censoriousness. Instances in which you have had a 
bitter spirit, and spoken of Christians in a manner entirely 
devoid of charity and love — charity, which requires you al- 
ways to hope the best the case will admit, and to put the best 
construction upon any ambiguous conduct. 

5. Slander. The times *you have spoken behind people's 
backs of their faults, real or supposed, of members of the 
church or others, unnecessarily or without good reason. This 
is slander. You need not lie to be guilty of slander; — to tell 
the truth with the design to injure, is slander. 

6. Levity. How often have you trifled before God, as you 
would not have dared to trifle in the presence of an earthly 
sovereign? You have either been an Atheist, and forgotten 
that there was a God, or have had less respect for him, and 
his presence, than you would have had for an earthly judge. 

7. Lying. Understand now what lying is. Any species of 
designed deception for a selfhh reason is lying. If the de- 



HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL. 43 

ception is not a design it is not lying. But if you design to 
make an impression contrary to the naked truth, you lie. 
Put down all those eases you can recollect. Don't call them 
by any soft name. God calls them LIES, and charges you 
with LYING, and you had better charge yourself correctly. 
How innumerable are the falsehoods perpetrated every day, 
in business, and in social intercourse, by words, and looks, 
and actions— designed to make an impression on others con- 
trary to the truth for selfish reasons. 

8. Cheating, Set down all the cases in which you have 
dealt with an individual, and done to him that which you 
would not like to have done to you. That is cheating. God 
has laid down a rule in the case ; " All things whatsover ye 
would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them." 
That is the rule ; and now if you have not done so you are 
a cheat. Mind, the rule is not that you should do what you 
might reasonably expect them to do to you. That is a rule 
which would admit of every degree of wickedness. But it is 
"As ye WOULD they should do to you." 

9. Hypocrisy. For instance, in your prayers and confessions 
to God. Set down the instances in which you have prayed 
for things you did not really want. And the evidence is, 
that when you have done praying, you could not tell what you 
had prayed for. How many times have you confessed sins 
that you did not mean to break off, and when you had no 
solemn purpose not to repeat them ? Yes, have confessed 
sins when you knew you as much expected to go and repeat 
them as you expected to live. 

10. Robbing God. Instances in which you have misspent 
your time, and squandered hours which God gave you to serve 
him and save souls, in vain amusements or foolish conversa- 
tion, reading novels, or doing nothing ; cases where you have 
misapplied your talents and powers of mind ; where you have 
squandered money on your lusts, or spent it for things you did 
not need, and which neither contributed to your health, com- 
fort or usefulness. Perhaps some of you who are here to- 
night have laid out God's money for TOBACCO. I will not 
speak of rum, for I presume there is no professor of religion 
here to-night that would drink rum. I hope there is no one 
that uses the filthy poison, tobacco. Think of a professor of 
religion, using God's money to poison himself with tobacco ! 

11. Bad temper. Perhaps you have abused your wife, or 
your children, or your family, or servants, or neighbors. 
Write it all down. 

12. Hindering others from being useful. Perhaps you have 



44 HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL. 

weakened their influence by insinuations against them. You 
have not only robbed God of your own talents, but tied the 
hands of somebody else. What a wicked servant is he that 
loiters himself, and hinders the rest ! This is done sometimes 
by taking their time needlessly ; sometimes by destroying 
Christian confidence in them. Thus you have played into the 
hands of Satan, and not only showed yourself an idle vaga- 
bond, but prevented others from working. 

If you find you have committed a fault against an individual, 
and that individual is within your reach, go and confess it im- 
mediately, and get that out of the way. If the individual you 
have injured is too far off for you to go and see him, sit down 
and write him a letter, and confess the injury, pay the postage, 
and put it into the mail immediately. I say, pay the postage, 
or otherwise you will only make the matter worse. You will 
add to the former injury, by making him a bill of expense. 
The man that writes a letter on his own business, and sends it 
to another without paying the postage, is dishonest, and has 
cheated him out of so much. And if he would cheat a man 
out of a sixpence or shilling, when the temptation is so small, 
what would he not do were the temptation greater, if he 
had the prospect of impunity ? If you have defrauded any 
body, send the money, the full amount and the interest. 

Go thoroughly to work in all this. Go now. Don't put it 
off ; that will only make the matter worse. Confess to God 
those sins that have been committed against God, and to man 
those sins that have been committed against man. Don't 
think of getting off by going round the stumbling blocks. 
Take them up out of the way. In breaking up your fallow 
ground, you must remove every obstruction. Things may be 
left that you may think little things, and you may wonder 
why you do not feel as you wish to in religion, when the rea- 
son is that your proud and carnal mind has covered up some- 
thing which God required you to confess and remove. Break 
up all the ground and turn it over. Do not balk it, as the 
farmers say; do not turn aside for little difficulties ; drive the 
plow right through them, beam deep, and turn the ground 
all up, so that it may all be mellow and soft, and fit to re- 
ceive the seed and bear fruit a hundred fold. 

"When you have gone over your whole history in this way, 
thoroughly, if you will then go over the ground the second 
time, and give your solemn and fixed attention to it, you will 
find that the things you have put down will suggest other 
things of which you have been guilty, connected with them, 
or near them. Then go over it a third time, and you will 



HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL. 45 

recollect other things connected with these. And yon will 
find in the end that yon can remember an amount of your 
history, and particular actions, even in this life, which you 
did not think you should remember in eternity. Unless you 
do take up your sins in this way, and consider them in detail, 
one by one, you can form no idea of the amount of your sins. 
You should go over it as thoroughly and as carefully, and as 
solemnly, as you would if you were just preparing yourself 
for the judgment. 

As you go over the catalogue of your sins, be sure to resolve 
upon present and entire reformation. Wherever you find any 
thing wrong, resolve at once, in the strength of God, to sin no 
more in that way. It will be of no benefit to examine your- 
self, unless you determine to amend in every particular that 
you find wrong in heart, temper, or conduct. 

If you find, as you go on with this duty, that your mind is 
still all dark, cast about you, and you will find there is some 
reason for the Spirit of God to depart from you. You have 
not been faithful and thorough. In the progress of such a 
work you have got to do violence to yourself, and bring your- 
self as a rational being up to this work, with the Bible before 
you, and try your heart till you do feel. You need not expect 
that God will work a miracle for you to break up your fallow 
ground. It is to be done by means. Fasten your attention 
to the subject of your sins. You cannot look at your sins long 
and thoroughly, and see how bad they are, without feeling, 
and feeling deeply. Experience abundantly proves the benefit 
of going over our history in this way. Set yourself to the 
work now ; resolve that you never will stop till you find you 
can pray. You never will have the spirit of prayer, till you 
examine yourself, and confess your sins, and break up your 
fallow ground. You never will have the Spirit of God dwell- 
ing in you, till you Jiave unraveled this whole mystery of in- 
iquity, and spread out your sins before God. Let there be this 
deep work of repentance, and full confession, this breaking 
down before God, and you will have as much of the spirit of 
prayer as your body can bear up under. The reason why so 
few Christians know any thing about the spirit of prayer, is 
because they never would take the pains to examine themselves 
properly, and so never knew what it was to have their hearts 
all broken up in this way. 

You see I have only begun to lay open this subject to-night. 
I want to lay it out before you, in the course of these lectures, 
so that if you will begin and go on to do as I say, the results 
will be just as certain as they are when the farmer breaks up 



46 HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL. 

a fallow field, and mellows it, and sows his grain. It will be 
so, if you will only begin in this way, and hold on till all your 
hardened and callous hearts break up. 



REMARKS. 

1. It will do no good to preach to you while your hearts are 
in this hardened, and waste, and fallow state. The farmer 
might just as well sow his gTain on the rock. It will bring 
forth no fruit. This is the reason why there are so many 
fruitless professors in the church, and why there is so much 
outside machinery, and so little deep-toned feeling in the 
church. Look at the Sabbath-school for instance, and see how 
much machinery there is, and how little of the power of godli- 
ness. If you go on in this way, the word of God will continue 
to harden you, and you will grow worse and worse, just as the 
rain and snow on an old fallow field makes the turf thicker, 
and the clods stronger. 

2. See why so much preaching is wasted, and worse than 
wasted. It is because the church will not break up their fal- 
low ground. A preacher may wear out his life, and do very 
little good, while there are so many stony-ground hearers, who 
have never had their fallow ground broken up. They are only 
half converted, and their religion is rather a change of opinion 
than a change of the feeling of their hearts. There is mechani- 
cal religion enough, but very little that looks like deep heart- 
work. 

3. Professors of religion should never satisfy themselves, or 
expect a revival, just by starting out of their slumbers, and 
blustering about, and making a noise, and talking to sinners. 
They must get their fallow ground broken up. It is utterly 
unphilosophical to think of getting engaged in religion in this 
way. If your fallow ground is broken up, then the way to get 
more feeling, is to go out and see sinners on the road to hell, 
and talk to them, and guide inquiring souls, and you will get 
more feeling. You may get into an excitement without this 
breaking up ; you may show a kind of zeal, but it will not 
last long, and it will not take hold of shiners, unless your 
hearts are broken up. The reason is, that you go about it 
mechanically, and have not broken up your fallow ground. 

4. And now, finally, will you break up your fallow ground ? 
Will you enter upon the course now pointed out, and perse- 
vere till you are thoroughly awake ? If you fail here, if you 
do- not do this, and get prepared, you can go no further with 
me in this course of lectures. I have gone with you as far as 



HOW TO PROMOTE A REVIVAL. 47 

it is of any use to go, until your fallow ground is broken up. 
Now, you must make thorough work upon this point, or all I 
hare further to say will do you little good. Nay, it will only 
harden and make you worse. If, when next Friday night ar- 
rives, it finds you with unbroken hearts, you need not expect 
to be benefited by what I shall say. If you do not set about 
this work immediately, I shall take it for granted that you do 
not mean to be revived, that you have forsaken your minister, 
and mean to let him go up to battle alone. If you do not do 
this, I charge you with having forsaken Christ, with refusing 
to repent and do your first work. But if you will be prepared 
to enter upon the work, I propose, God willing, next Eriday 
evening, to lead you into the work of saving sinners. 



LECTUEE IV. 



PEEVAILING PRAYEB. 

Text.— The effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.— 
James v. 16. 

The last lecture referred principally to the confession of sin. 
To-niglit my remarks will be chiefly confined to the subject of 
intercession, or prayer. There are two kinds of means requi- 
site to promote a revival ; one to influence men. the other to 
influence God. The truth is employed to influence men, and 
prayer to move God. When I speak of moving God, I do not 
mean that God's mind is changed by prayer, or that his dis- 
position or character is changed. But prayer produces such 
a change in us and fulfils such conditions as renders it consis- 
tent for God to do as it would not be consistent for him to do 
otherwise. When a sinner repents, that state of mind makes 
it proper for God to forgive him. God has always been ready 
to forgive him on that condition, so that when the sinner 
changes his mind towards God, it requires no change of feel- 
ing in God to pardon him. It is the sinner's repentance that 
renders his forgiveness proper, and is the occasion of God's 
acting as he does. So when Christians offer effectual prayer, 
their state of mind renders it proper for God to answer them. 
He was always ready to bestow the blessing, on the condition 
tnat they felt right, and offered the right kind of prayer. 
Whenever this change takes place in. them, and they offer the 
right kind of prayer, then God, without any change in him- 
self, can answer them. When we offer effectual fervent prayer 
for others, the fact that we offer such prayer renders it con- 
sistent for him to do what we pray for, when otherwise it 
would not have been consistent. 

Prayer is an essential link in the chain of causes that lead 
to a revival ; as much so as truth is. Some have zealously 
used truth to convert men, and laid very little stress on prayer. 
They have preached, and talked, and distributed tracts with 
great zeal, and then wondered that they had so little success. 
And the reason was, that they forgot to use the other branch 
of the means, effectual prayer. They overlooked the fact, that 
truth by itself will never produce the effect, without the Spirit 
(48) 



PREVAILING PRAYER. 49 

of God, and that the Spirit is given in answer to earnest 
prayer. 

Sometimes it happens that those who are the most engaged 
in employing truth, are not the most engaged in prayer. This 
is always unhappy. — For unless they, or somebody else have 
the spirit of prayer, the truth by itself will do nothing but 
harden men in impenitence. Probably in the day of judg- 
ment it will be found that nothing is ever done by the truth, 
used ever so zealously, unless there is a spirit of prayer some- 
where in connection with the presentation of truth. 

Others err on the other side. Not that they lay too much 
stress on prayer. But they overlook the fact that prayer 
might be offered for ever, by itself, and nothing would be 
done. Because sinners are not converted by direct contact 
of the Holy Ghost, but by the truth, employed as a means. 
To expect the conversion of sinners by prayer alone, without 
the employment of truth, is to tempt God. 

The subject of discourse this evening, is 



PREVAILING PRAYER. 

I. I propose to show what is effectual or prevailing prayer. 

II. State some of the most essential attributes of prevail- 
ing prayer. 

in. Give some reasons why God requires this kind of 
prayer. 

IV. Show that such prayer will avail much. 
I. I proceed to show what is prevailing prayer. 

1. Effectual, prevailing prayer, does not consist in benevo- 
lent desires merely. Benevolent desires are doubtless pleas- 
ing to God. Such desires pervade heaven, and are found in 
all holy beings. But they are not prayer. Men may have 
these desires as the angels and glorified spirits have them. 
But this is not the effectual, prevailing prayer, spoken of in 
the text. Prevailing prayer is something more than this. 

2. Prevailing, or effectual prayer, is that prayer which ob- 
tains the blessing that it seeks. It is that prayer which ef- 
fectually moves God. The very idea of effectual prayer is, that 
it effects its object. 

II. I will state some of the most essential attributes of pre- 
vailing prayer. I cannot detail in full all the things that go 
to make up prevailing prayer. But I will mention some 
things that are essential to it ; some things which a person 
must do in order to prevail in prayer. 

1. He must pray for a definite object He need not expect 
3 



50 PREVAILING PRAYER. 

to offer such prayer, if he prays at random, without any dis- 
tinct or definite object. He must have an object distinctly be- 
fore his mind. I speak now of secret prayer. Many people 
go away into their closets, because they must say their prayers. 
The time has come that they are in the habit of going by 
themselves for prayer, in the morning, or at noon, or at what- 
ever time of day it may be. And instead of having any thing 
to say, any definite object before their mind, they fall down 
on their knees, and pray for just what comes into their minds, 
for everything that floats in their imagination at the time, 
and when they have done, they can not tell hardly a word 
of what they have been praying for. This is not effectual 
prayer. What should we think of any body who should try 
to move a legislature so, and should say, " Now it is winter, 
and the legislature is in session, and it is time to send up 
petitions/' and should go up to the legislature and petition 
at random, without any definite object ? Do you think such 
petitions would move the legislature ? 

A man must have some definite object before his mind. 
He cannot pray effectually for a variety of objects at once. 
The mind of man is so constituted that it cannot fasten its 
desires intensely upon many things at the same time. All 
the instances of effectual prayer recorded in the Bible were 
of this kind. Wherever you see that the blessing sought for 
in prayer was attained, you will find that the prayer which 
was offered was prayer for that definite object. 

2. Prayer, to be effectual, must be in accordance with the 
revealed will of God. To pray for things contrary to the 
revealed will of God, is to tempt God. There are three ways 
in which God's will is revealed to men for their guidance in 
prayer. 

(1.) By express promises or predictions in the Bible, that 
he will give or do certain things. Either by express prom- 
ises in regard to particular things, or promises in general 
terms, so that we may apply them to particular things. For 
instance, there is this promise : " Whatsoever things ye de- 
sire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall 
have them.' 5 

(2.) Sometimes God reveals his will by his providence. 
When he makes it clear that such and such events are about 
to take place, it is as much a revelation as if he had written it 
in his word. It would b5 impossible to reveal every thing in 
the Bible. But God often makes it clear to those who have 
spiritual discernment, that it is his will to grant such and 
Fiieh blessings. 



PREVAILING PRAYER. 51 

(3.) By his Spirit. When God's people are at a loss what 
to pray for, agreeable to his will, his Spirit often instructs 
them. Where there is no particular revelation, and provi- 
dence leaves it dark, and we know not what to pray for as we 
ought, we are expressly told, that " the Spirit also helpeth 
our infirmities," and "the Spirit itself maketh intercession for 
us with groanings that cannot be uttered." A great deal has 
been said on the subject of praying in faith for things not re- 
vealed. It is objected, that this doctrine implies a new reve- 
lation. I answer, that, new or old, it is the very revelation 
that Jehovah says he makes. It is just as plain here, as if it 
were now revealed by a voice from heaven, that the Spirit of 
God helps the people of God to pray according to the will of 
God, when they themselves know not what things they ought 
to pray for. " And he that searcheth the heart knoweth the 
mind of the Spirit," because he maketh intercession for the 
saints according to the will of God, and he leads Chris- 
tians to pray for just those things, with groanings that 
cannot be uttered. When neither the word nor providence 
enables them to decide, then let them be filled with the Spirit, 
as God commands them to be. He says, " Be ye filled with 
the Spirit." And He will lead their minds to such things as 
God is willing to grant. 

3. To pray effectually, you must pray with submission to 
the will of God. Do not confound submission with indiffer- 
ence. No two things are more unlike. I once knew an indi- 
vidual come where there was a revival. He himself was 
cold, and did not enter into the spirit of it, and had no 
spirit of prayer ; and when he heard the brethren pray as if 
they could not be denied, he was shocked at their bold- 
ness, and kept all the time insisting on the importance of 
praying with submission ; when it was as plain as any thing 
could be, that he confounded submission with indifference. 

So again, do not confound submission in prayer with a 
general confidence that God will do what is right. It is 
proper to have this confidence that God will do what is right 
in all things. But this is a different thing from submission. 
What I mean by submission in prayer, is, acquiescence in the 
revealed will of God. To submit to any command of God is 
to obey it. Submission to some supposable or possible, but 
secret decree of God, is not submission. To submit to any 
dispensation of Providence is impossible till it comes. For 
we never can know what the event is to be, till it takes 
place. Take a case : David, when his child was sick, was 
distressed, and agonized in prayer, and refused to be com- 



52 PREVAILING PRAYER. 

forted. He took it so much to heart, that when the child 
died, his servants were afraid to tell him the child was dead, 
for fear he would vex himself still worse. But as soon as he 
heard that the child was dead, he laid aside his grief, and 
arose, and asked for food, and ate and drank as usual. While 
the child was yet alive, he did not know what was the will of 
God, and so he fasted and prayed, and said, " Who can tell 
whether God will be gracious to me, that my child may live ?" 
He did not know but that his prayer and agony was the very 
thing on which it turned, whether the child was to live or 
not He thought that if he humbled himself and entreated 
God, perhaps God would spare him this blow. But as soon 
as God's will appeared, and the child was dead, he bowed like 
a saint. He seemed not only to acquiesce, but actually to 
take a satisfaction in it. " I shall go to him, but he shall not 
return to me." This was true submission. He reasoned 
correctly in the case. While he had no revelation of the will 
of God, he did not know but what the child's recovery de- 
pended on his prayer. But when he had a revelation of the 
will of God, he submitted. While the will of God is not 
known, to submit, without prayer, is tempting God. Per- 
haps, and for aught you know, the fact of your offering the 
right kilid of prayer, may he the thing on which the event 
turns. In the case of an impenitent friend, the very condi- 
tion on which he is to be saved from hell, may be the ferven- 
cy and importunity of your prayer for that individual 

4. Effectual prayer for an object implies a desire for that 
object commensurate with its importance. If a person truly 
desires any blessing, his desires will bear some proportion to 
the greatness of the blessing. The desires of the Lord Jesus 
Christ for the blessing he prayed for, were amazingly strong, 
and amounted even to agony. If the desire for an object is 
strong, and is a benevolent desire, and the thing not con- 
trary to the will and providence of God, the presumption is, 
that it will be granted. There are two reasons for this pre- 
sumption. 

(1.) From the general benevolence of God. If it is a de- 
sirable object ; if, so far as we can see, it would be an act of 
benevolence in God to grant it, his general benevolence is 
presumptive evidence that he will grant it. 

(2.) If you find yourself exercised with benevolent de- 
sires for any object, there is a strong presumption that the 
Spirit of God is exciting these very desires, and stirring you 
up to pray for that object, so that it may be granted in an- 
swer to prayer. In such a case no degree of desire or 



PREVAILING PRAYER. 53 

importunity in prayer is improper. A Christian may come 
up, as it were, and take hold of the hand of God. See the 
case of Jacob, when he exclaimed, in an agony of desire, " I 
will not let thee go, except thou bless me." Was God dis- 
pleased with his boldness and importunity ? Not at all ; but 
he granted him the very thing he prayed for. So in the case 
of Moses. God said to Moses, " Let me alone, that I may 
destroy them, and blot out their name from under heaven, 
and I will make of thee a nation mightier and greater than 
they." What did Moses do? Did he stand aside and let 
God do as he said ? No, his mind runs back to the Egyp- 
tians, and he thinks how they will triumph. " Wherefore 
should the Egyptians say, For mischief did he bring them 
out." It seemed as if he took hold of the uplifted hand of 
God, to avert the blow. Did God rebuke him for his inter- 
ference, and teil him he had no business to interfere ? No ; 
it seemed as if he was unable to deny any thing to such im- 
portunity, and so Moses stood in the gap, and prevailed with 
God. 

It is said of Xavier, the missionary, that he was once called 
to pray for a man who was sick, and he prayed so fervently 
that he seemed as it were to do violence to heaven — so the 
writer expresses it. And he prevailed, and the man recov- 
ered. 

Such prayer is often offered in the present day, when 
Christians have been wrought up to such a pitch of impor- 
tunity and such a holy boldness, that afterwards, when they 
looked back upon it, they were frightened and amazed at 
themselves, to think they should dare to exercise such impor- 
tunity with God. And yet these prayers have prevailed, and 
obtained the blessing. And many of these persons, that I 
am acquainted with, are among the holiest persons I know in 
the world. 

5. Prayer, to be effectual, must be offered from right mo- 
tives. Prayer should not be selfish, but dictated by a su- 
preme regard for the glory of God. A great deal of prayer is 
offered from pure selfishness. Women sometimes pray 
for their husbands, that they may be converted, because they 
say, " It would be so much more pleasant to have my hus- 
band go to meeting with me," and all that. And they seem 
never to lift up their thoughts above self at all. They do 
not seem to think how their husbands are dishonoring God 
by their sins, and how God would be glorified in their con- 
version. So it is with parents very often. They can not 
bear to think that their children should be lost. They pray 



54 PREVAILING PRAYER. 

for them very earnestly indeed But if you go to talk with 
them, they are very tender, and tell you how good their chil- 
dren are, how they respect religion, and they think they are 
almost Christians now ; and so they talk as if they were 
afraid you would hurt their children if you should tell them the 
truth. They do not think how such amiable and lovely chil- 
dren are dishonoring God by their sins ; they are only think- 
ing what a dreadful thing it will be for them to go to hell. 
Ah ! unless their thoughts rise higher than this, their prayers 
will never prevail with a holy God. The temptation to selfish 
motives is so strong, that there is reason to fear a great many 
parental prayers never rise above the yearnings of parental 
tenderness. And that is the reason why so many prayers 
are not heard, and why so many pious, praying parents have 
ungodly children. Much of the prayer for the heathen world 
seems to be based on no higher principle than sympathy. 
Missionary agents, and others, are dwelling almost exclu- 
sively upon the six hundred millions of heathens going to 
hell, while little is said of their dishonoring God. This is a 
great evil ; and until the church have higher motives for 
prayer and missionary effort than sympathy for the heathen, 
their prayers and efforts will never amount to much. 

6. Prayer, to be effectual, must be by the intercession of the 
Spirit. You never can expect to offer prayer according to the 
will of God without the Spirit. In the first two cases, it is 
not because Christians are unable to offer such prayer, where 
the will of God is revealed in his word, or indicated by his 
providence. They are able to do it, just as they are able to be 
holy. But the fact is, that they are so wicked, that they never 
do offer such prayer, unless they are influenced by the Spirit 
of God. There must be a faith, such as is produced by the 
effectual operation of the Holy Ghost. 

7. It must be persevering prayer. As a general thing, 
Christians who have backslidden and lost the spirit of prayer, 
will not get at once into the habit, of persevering prayer. Their 
minds are not in a right state, and they cannot fix their minds, 
and hold on till the blessing comes. If their minds were in that 
state, that they would persevere till the answer comes, effectual 
prayer might be offered at once, as well as after praying ever 
so many times for an object. But they have to pray again and 
again, because their thoughts are so apt to wander away, and 
are so easily diverted from the object to something else. Until 
their minds get imbued with the spirit of prayer, they will not 
keep fixed to one point, and push their petition to an issue on 
the spot. Do not think you are prepared to offer prevailing 



fe 



PREVAILING PEAYEE. 55 

prayer, if your feelings will let you pray once for an object, 
and then leave it. Most Christians come up to prevailing 
prayer by a protracted process. Then minds gradually be- 
come filled with anxiety about an object, so that they will even 
go about their business, sighing out their desires to God. 
Just as the mother whose child is sick, goes round her house, 
sighing as if her heart would break. And if she is a praying- 
mother, her sighs are breathed out to God all the day long. 
If she goes out of the room where her child is, her mind is 
still on it ; and if she is asleep, still her thoughts are on it, 
and she starts in her dreams, thinking it is dying. Her whole 
mind is absorbed in that sick child. This is the state of mind 
in which Christians offer prevailing prayer. 

"What was the reason that Jacob wrestled all night in prayer 
with God ? He knew that he had clone his brother Esau a great 
injury, in getting away the birthright a long time ago. And now 
he was informed that his injured brother was coming to meet 
him, with an armed force altogether too powerful for him to con- 
tend against. And there was great reason to suppose he was 
coming with a purpose of revenge. There were two reasons 
then why he should be distressed. The first was, that he had 
done this great injury, and had never made any reparation. The 
other was, that Esau was coming with a force sufficient to 
crush him. Now, what does he do ? "Why, he first arranges 
everything in the best manner he can to meet his brother, send- 
ing his present first, then his property, then his family, putting 
those he loved most farthest behind. And by this time his mind 
was so exercised that he could not contain himself. He goes 
away alone over the brook, and pours out his very soul in an 
agony of prayer all night. And just as the day was breaking, 
the angel of the covenant said, " Let me go ; " and his whole 
being was, as it were, agonized at the thought of giving up, 
and he cried out, " I will not let thee go except thou bless me." 
His soul was wrought up into an agony, and he obtained the 
blessing, but he always bore the marks of it, and showed that 
his body had been greatly affected by this mental struggle. 
This is prevailing prayer. 

Now, do not deceive yourselves with thinking that you offer 
effectual prayer, unless you have this intense desire for the 
blessing. I clo not believe in it. Prayer is not effectual unless 
it is offered up with an agony of desire. The apostle Paul 
speaks of it as a travail of the soul. Jesus Christ, when he 
was praying in the garden, was in such an agony, that he 
sweat as it were great drops of blood falling down to the 
ground. I have never known a person sweat blood ; but I 



56 PREVAILING PRAYER. 

have known a person pray till the blood started from the nose. 
And I have known persons pray till they were ail wet with 
perspiration, in the coldest weather in winter. I have known 
persons pray for hours, till their strength was all exhausted 
with the agony of their minds. Such prayers prevailed with 
God. * 

This agony in prayer was prevalent in President Edwards' 
day, in the revivals that then took place. It was one of the 
great stumbling blocks in those days, to persons who were op- 
posed to the revival, that people used to pray till their bodies 
were overpowered with their feelings. I will read a paragraph 
of what President Edwards says on the subject, to let you see 
that this is not a new thing in the Church, but has always 
prevailed wherever revivals prevailed with power. It is from 
his Thoughts on Revivals. 

" We cannot determine that God never shall give any per- 
son so much of a discovery of himself, not only as to weaken 
their bodies, but to take away their lives. It is supposed by 
very learned and judicious divines, that Moses' life was taken 
away after tins manner ; and this has also been supposed to 
be the case with some other saints. Yea, I do not see any 
solid, sure grounds any have to determine, that God shall 
never make such strong impressions on the mind by his Spirit, 
that shall be an occasion of so impairing the frame of the 
body, and particularly that part of the body, the brain, that 
persons shall be deprived of the use of reason. As I said be- 
fore, it is too much for us to determine, that God will not 
bring an outward calamity in bestowing spiritual and eternal 
blessings : so it is too much for us to determine, how great 
an outward calamity he will bring. If God give a great in- 
crease of discoveries of himself, and of love to him, the be- 
nefit is infinitely greater than the calamity, though the life 
should presently after be taken away ; yea, though the soul 
should not immediately be taken to heaven, but should lie 
some years in a deep sleep, and then be taken to heaven ; or, 
which is much the same thing, if it be deprived of the use of 
its faculties, and be inactive and unserviceable, as if it lay in 
a deep sleep for some years, and then should pass into glory. 
We cannot determine how great a calamity distraction is, 
when considered with all its consequences, and all that might 
have been consequent, if the distraction had not happened ; 
nor indeed whether (thus considered) it be any calamity at 
all, or whether it be not a mercy, by preventing some great 
sin, Or some more dreadful thing, if it had not been. It 
were a great fault in us to limit a sovereign, all-w T ise God, 



PREVAILING PRAYER. 57 

whose judgments are a great deep, and his ways past finding 
out, where he has not limited himself, and in things concern- 
ing which he has not told us what his way shall be. It is 
remarkable, considering in what multitudes of instances, and 
to how great a degree, the frame of the body has been 
overpowered of late, that persons' lives have, notwithstand- 
ing, been preserved, and that the instances of those that have 
been deprived of reason, have been so very few, and those, 
perhaps all of them, persons under the peculiar disadvantage 
of a weak, vapory habit of body. A merciful and careful 
Divine hand is very manifest in it, that in so many instances 
where the ship has begun to sink, yet it has been upheld, and 
has not totally sunk. The instances of such as have been 
deprived of reason are so few, that certainly they are not 
enough to cause us to be in any fright, as though this work 
that has been carried on in the country was like to be of 
baneful influence ; unless we are disposed to gather up all 
that we can to darken it, and set it forth in frightful colors. 

" There is one particular kind of exercise and concern of 
mind, that many have been overpowered by, that has been 
especially stumbling to some ; and that is, the deep concern 
and distress that they have been in for the souls of others. 
I am sony that any put us to the trouble of doing that which 
seems so needless, as defending such a thing as this. It 
seems like mere trifling, in so plain a case, to enter into a for- 
mal and particular debate, in order to determine whether 
there be anything in the greatness and importance of the 
case that will answer and bear a proportion to the greatness 
of the concern that some have manifested. Men may be al- 
lowed, from no higher a principle than common ingenuity and 
humanity, to be very deeply concerned and greatly exercised 
in mind at seeing others in great danger of no greater a ca- 
lamity than drowning, or being burnt up in a house on fire. 
And if so, then doubtless it will be allowed to be equally 
reasonable, if they saw them in danger of a calamity ten 
times greater, to be still much more concerned ; and so much 
more still, if the calamity was still vastly greater. And why, 
then, should it be thought unreasonable, and looked upon 
with a very suspicious eye, as if it must come from some bad 
cause, when persons are extremely concerned at seeing others 
in very great danger of suffering the fierceness and wrath of 
Almighty God to all eternity ? And, besides, it will doubt- 
less be allowed that those that have very great degrees of the 
Spirit of God, that is, a spirit of love, may well be supposed 
to have vastly more of love and compassion to their fellow- 
3* 



58 PREVAILING PRAYER. 

creatures, tlian those that are influenced only by common 
humanity. Why should it be thought strange that those 
that are full of the Spirit of Christ should be proportionably, 
in their love to souls, like to Christ ? who had so strong a love 
to them and concern for them as to be willing to drink the 
dregs of the cup of Grod's fury for them ; and at the same 
time that he offered up his blood for souls, offered up also, 
as their high priest, strong crying and tears, with an extreme 
agony, when the soul of Christ was, as it were, in travail for 
the souls of the elect ; and, therefore, in saving them, he is 
said to see of the travail of his soul. As such a spirit of love 
to and concern for souls was the spirit of Christ, so it is the 
spirit of the church ; and, therefore, the church, in desiring 
and seeking that Christ might be brought forth in the world 
and in the souls of men, is represented, Rev. xii., as ' a 
woman crying, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered.' 
The spirit of those that have been in distress for the souls of 
others, so far as I can discern, seems not to be different from 
that of the apostle, who travailed for souls, and was ready to 
wish himself accursed from Christ for others. And that of 
the Psalmist, Psalm cxix. 53, ' Horror hath taken hold upon 
me, because of the wicked that forsake thy law.' And v. 136, 
' Eivers of waters run down mine eyes, because they keep not 
thy law.' And that of the prophet Jeremiah, Jer. iv. 19, 
'My bowels! my bowels! I am pained at my very heart; 
My heart maketh a noise in me : I cannot hold my peace, 
because thou has heard, O my soul, the sound of the trum- 
pet, the alarm of war ! ' And so, chap. ix. 1, and xiii. 17, and 
Isa. xxii. 4. We read of Mordeeai, when he saw his people 
in danger of being destroyed with a temporal destruction, 
Esther iv. 1, that he e rent his clothes, and put on sackcloth 
and ashes, and went out into the midst of the city, and cried 
with a loud and bitter cry. And why, then, should persons 
be thought to be distracted, when they cannot forbear crying 
out at the consideration of the misery of those that are going 
to eternal destruction ? " * 

I have read this to show that this thing was common in 
the great revivals of those days. It has always been so in 
all great revivals, and has been more or less common in pro- 
portion to the greatness, and extent, and depth of the work. 
It was so in the great revivals in Scotland, and multitudes 
used to be overpowered, and some almost died, by the depth 
of their agony. 

* Edwards' Works, vol. iv. p. 85, New York edition. 



PREVAILING PRAYER. 59 

9. If you mean to pray effectually, you must pray a great 
deal. It was said of the apostle James, that after he was 
dead it was found his .knees were callous like a camel's knees, 
by praying so much. Ah ! here was the secret of the success 
of those primitive ministers. They had callous knees. 

10. If you intend prayer to be effectual, it must be offered 
in the name of Christ. You cannot come to God in your own 
name. You cannot plead your own merits. But you can 
come in, a name that is always acceptable. You all know 
what it is to use the name of a man. If you should go to the 
bank with a draft or note, endorsed by John Jacob Astor, 
that would be giying you his name, and you know you could 
get the money from the bank just as well as he could himself. 
Now, Jesus Christ gives you the use of his name. And when 
you pray in the name of Christ, the meaning of it is, that 
you can prevail just as well as he could himself, and receive 
just as much as God's well-beloved Son would if he were to 
pray himself for the same things. But you must pray in 
faith. His name has all the virtue in your lips that it has in 
his own, and God is just as free to bestow blessings upon you, 
when you ask in the name of Christ, and in faith, as he would 
be to bestow them upon Christ, if he should ask. 

11. You cannot prevail in prayer, without renouncing all 
your sins. You must not only recall them to mind, but you 
must actually renounce them, and leave them off, and in the 
purpose of your heart renounce them all for ever. 

12. You must pray in faith. You must expect to obtain 
the things you ask for. You need not look for an answer to 
prayer, if you pray without any expectation of obtaining it. 
You are not to form such expectations without any reason for 
them. In the cases I have supposed, there is a reason for the 
expectation. In case the thing is revealed in God's word, if 
you pray without an expectatian of receiving the blessings, 
you just make God a liar. If the will of God is indicated by 
his providence, you ought to depend on it, according to the 
clearness of the indication, so far as to expect the blessing if 
you pray for it. And if you are led by his Spirit to pray for 
certain things, you have just as much reason to expect the 
thing to be done as if God had revealed it in his word. 

But some say, "Will not this view of the leadings of the 
Spirit of God lead people into fanaticism ? " I answer, that 
I know not but many may deceive themselves in respect to 
this matter. Multitudes have deceived themselves in regard 
to all the other points of religion. And if some people should 
think they are led by the Spirit of God, when it is nothing 



60 PREVAILING PRAYER. 

but their own imagination, is that any reason why those who 
know that they are led by the Spirit should not follow ? Many 
people suppose themselves to be converted when they are not. 
Is that any reason why we should not cleave to the Lord Je- 
sus Christ ? Suppose some people are deceived in thinking 
they love God, is that any reason why the pious saint who 
knows he has the love of God shed abroad in his heart, should 
not give vent to his feelings in songs of praise ? So I sup- 
pose some may deceive themselves in thinking they are led by 
the Spirit of God. But there is no need of being deceived. 
If people follow impulses, it is their own fault. I do not 
want you to follow impulses. I want you to be sober mind- 
ed, and follow the sober, rational leadings of the Spirit of 
God. There are those who understand what I mean, and who 
know very well what it is to give themselves up to the Spirit 
of God in prayer. 

III. I will state some of the reasons why these things are 
essential to effectual prayer. Why does God require such 
prayer, such strong desires, such agonizing supplications ? 

1. These strong desires strongly illustrate the strength of 
God's feelings. They are like the real feelings of God for im- 
penitent sinners. When I have seen, as I sometimes have, 
the amazing strength of love for souls that has been felt by 
Christians, I have been wonderfully impressed with the amaz- 
ing love of God, and his desires for their salvation. The case 
of a certain woman, of whom I read, in a revival, made the 
greatest impression on my mind. She had such an unutter- 
able compassion and love for souls, that she actually panted 
for breath almost to suffocation. What must be the strength 
of the desire which God feels, when his Spirit produces in 
Christians such amazing agony, such throes of soul, such tra- 
vail — God has chosen the best word to express it — it is travail 
— travail of the soul. 

I have seen a man of as much strength of intellect and 
muscle as any man in the community, fall down prostrate, 
absolutely overpowered by his unutterable desires for sinners. 
I know this is a stumbling block to many ; and it alw ays will 
be as long as there remain in the church so many blind and 
stupid professors of religion. But I cannot doubt that these 
things are the work of the Spirit of God. Oh that the whole 
church could be so filled with the Spirit as to travail in pray- 
er, till a nation should.be born in a day ! 

It is said in the word of God, that as soon " as Zion travail- 
ed, she brought forth." What does that mean? I asked a 
professor of religion this question once. He was making ex- 



PREVAILING PRAYER. 61 

ceptions about our ideas of effectual prayer, and I asked him 
what he supposed was meant by Zion's travailing. " Oh," said 
he, " it means that as soon as the church walk together in the 
fellowship of the Gospel, then it will be said that Zion travels ! 
This walking together is called travelling" Not the same term, 
you see. So much he knew. 

2. These strong desires that I have described, are the nat- 
ural results of great benevolence and clear views of the dan- 
ger of sinners. It is perfectly reasonable that it should be so. 
If the women who are in this house should look up there, and 
see a family burning to death in the fire, and hear their shrieks, 
and behold their agony, they would feel distressed, and it is 
very likely that many of them would faint away with agony. 
And nobody would wonder at it, or say they were fools or 
crazy to feel so much distressed at such an awful sight. They 
would think it strange if there were not some expressions of 
powerful feeling. Why is it any wonder, then, if Christians 
should feel as I have described, when they have clear views 
of the state of sinners, and the awful danger they are in ? 
The fact is, that those individuals who never have felt so, have 
never had much real benevolence, and their piety must be of 
a very superficial character. I do not mean to judge harshly, 
or to speak unkindly. But I state it as a simple matter of 
fact ; and people may talk about it as they please, but I know 
that such piety is superficial. This is not censoriousness, but 
plain truth. 

People sometimes wonder at Christians having such feel- 
ings. Wonder at what ? Why, at the natural, and philosoph- 
ical, and necessary results of deep piety towards God, and 
deep benevolence towards man, in view of the great danger 
they see sinners to be in. 

3. The soul of a Christian, when it is thus burdened, must 
have relief. God rolls this weight upon the soul of a Chris- 
tian, for the purpose of bringing him near to himself. Chris- 
tians are often so unbelieving, that they will not exercise prop- 
er faith in God, till he rolls this burden upon them, so heavy 
that they cannot live under it, and then they must go to God 
for relief. It is like the case of many a convicted sinner. God 
is willing to receive him at once, if he will come right to him, 
with faith in Jesus Christ. But the sinner will not come. He 
hangs back, and struggles, and groans under the burden of 
his sins, and w 7 ill not throw himself upon God, till his burden 
of conviction becomes so great that he can live no longer ; 
and when he is driven to desperation, as it were, and feels as 
if he was ready to sink into hell, he makes a mighty plunge, 



62 PREVAILING PRAYER. 

and throws himself upon God's mercy as his only hope. It 
was his duty to come before. God had no delight in his dis- 
tress, for its own sake. It was only the sinner's obstinacy 
that created the necessity for all this distress. He would not 
come without it. So when professors of religion get loaded 
down with the weight of souls, they often pray again and 
again, and yet the burden is not gone, nor their distress abat-. 
ed, because they h£ve never thrown it all upon God in faith. 
But they cannot get rid of the burden. So long as their benev- 
olence continues it will remain and increase, and unless they 
resist and quench the Holy Ghost they can get no relief, until 
at length, when they are driven to extremity, they make a des- 
perate effort, roll the burden off upon the Lord Jesus Christ, 
and exercise a child-like confidence in him. Then they feel 
relieved ; then they feel as if the soul they were praying for 
would be saved. The burden is gone, and God seems in 
kindness to sooth down the mind to feel a sweet assurance 
that the blessing will be granted. Often, after a Christian 
has had this struggle, this agony in prayer, and has obtained 
relief in this way, you will find the sweetest and most heav- 
enly affections flow out — the •soul rests sweetly and glori- 
ously in God, and rejoices, " with joy unspeakable and fall of 
glory." 

Do any of you think now, that there are no such things in 
the experience of believers ? I tell you, if I had time, I could 
show you from President Edwards, and other approved 
writers, cases and descriptions just like this. Do you ask why 
we never have such things here in New York ? I tell you, it 
is not at all because you are so much wiser than Christians 
are in the country, or because you have so much more intelli- 
gence or more enlarged views of the nature of religion, or a 
more stable and well regulated piety. I tell you, no ; instead 
of priding yourselves in being free from such extravagances, 
you ought to hide your heads, because Christians in New York 
are so worldly, and have so much starch, and pride, and fash- 
ion, that they cannot come clown to such spirituality as this. 
I wish it could be so. Oh that there might be such a spirit 
in this city, and in this church ! I know it would make a 
noise, if we had such things done here. But I would not care 
for that. Let them say, if they please, that the folks in Chat- 
ham Chapel are getting deranged. "We need not be afraid of 
that, if we could five near enough to God te enjoy his Spirit 
in the manner I have described. 

4. These effects of the spirit of prayer upon the body are 
themselves no part of religion. It is only that the body is 



PREVAILING PRAYER. 63 

often so weak that the feelings of the soul overpower it. 
These bodily effects are not at all essential to prevailing 
prayer, but only a natural or physical result of highly excited 
emotions of the mind. It is not at all unusual for the body 
to be weakened and even overcome by any powerful emotion 
of the mind, on other subjects beside religion. The door-keeper 
of Congress in the time of the revolution, fell down dead on 
the reception of some highly cheering intelligence. I knew a 
woman in Rochester, who was in a great agony of prayer for 
the conversion of her son-in-law. One morning he was at an 
anxious meeting, and she remained at home praying for him. 
At the close of the meeting, he came home a convert, and she 
was so rejoiced that she fell down and died on the spot. It 
is no more strange that these effects should be produced by 
religion than by strong feeling on any other subject. It is 
not essential to prayer, but the natural result of great effort 
of the mind. 

5. Doubtless one great reason why God requires the exer- 
cise of this agonizing prayer is, that it forms such a bond of 
union between Christ and the Church. It creates such a sym- 
pathy between them. It is as if Christ came and poured the 
overflowings of his own benevolent heart into his church, and 
led them to sympathize and to co-operate with him, as they 
never do in any other way. They feel just as Christ feels — so 
full of compassion for sinners that they cannot contain them- 
selves. Thus it is often with those ministers who are distin- 
guished for their success in preaching to sinners ; they often 
have such compassion, such overflowing desires for their sal- 
vation, that it shows itself in their speaking, and their preach- 
ing, just as though Jesus Christ spoke through them. The 
words come from their lips fresh and warm, as if from the 
very heart of Christ. I do not mean that he dictates their 
words ; but he excites the feelings that give utterance to them. 
Then you see a movement in the hearers, as if Christ himself 
spoke through lips of day. 

6. This travailing in birth for souls creates also a remarka- 
ble bond of union between warm-hearted Christians and the 
young converts. Those who are converted appear very dear 
to the hearts that have had this spirit of prayer for them. 
The feeling is like that of a mother for her first-born. Paul 
expresses it beautifully, when he says, " My little children ! " 
His heart was warm and tender to them. " My little chil- 
dren, of whom I travail in birth again" They had backslidden, 
and he has all the agonies of a parent over a wandering child. 
" I travail in birth again, till Christ be formed in you, the hope 



64 PREVAILING PRAYER. 

of glory." Li a revival, I have often noticed how those who 
have had the spirit of prayer, love the young converts. I 
know this is all algebra to those who have never felt it. But 
to those who have experienced the agony of wrestling, pre- 
vailing prayer, for the conversion of a soul, you may depend 
upon it, that soul, after it is converted, appears as dear as a 
child is to the mother who has brought it forth with pain. He 
has agonized for it, and received it in answer to prayer, and 
can present it before the Lord Jesus Christ, saying, " Here, < 
Lord, am I, and the children thou hast given me." 

7. Another reason why God requires this sort of prayer is, 
that it is the only way in which the church can be properly 
prepared to receive great blessings without being injured by 
them. When the church is thus prostrated in the dust before 
God, and is in the depth of agony in prayer, the blessing does 
them good. "While at the same time, if they had received the 
blessing without this deep prostration of soul, it would have 
puffed them up with pride. But as it is, it increases their 
holiness, then- love, their humility. 

IV. I am to show that such prayer as I have described 
will avail much. But time fails me to go into a particular de- 
tail of the evidence which I intended to bring forward under 
this head. 

Elijah the prophet mourned over the declensions of the 
house of Israel, and when he saw that no other means were 
likely to be effectual, to prevent a perpetual going away into 
idolatry, he prayed that the judgments of God might come 
upon the gmlty nation. He prayed that it might not rain, 
and God shut up the heavens for three years and six months, 
till the people were driven to the last extremity. And when 
he saw that it was time to relent, what does he do ? See him 
go up to the mountain and bow down in prayer. He wished 
to be alone ; and he told his servant to go seven times, while 
he was agonizing in prayer. The last time, the servant told 
him there was a little cloud appeared, like a man's hand, and 
he instantly arose from his knees — the blessing was obtained. 
The time had come for the calamity to be turned back. "Ah, 
but," you say, "Elijah was a prophet." Now do not make 
this objection. They made it in the apostle's days, and what 
does the apostle say ? Why he brought forward this very 
instance, and the fact that Elijah was a man of like passions 
with ourselves, as a case of prevailing prayer, and insisted 
that they should pray so too. 

John Knox was a man famous for his power in prayer, so 
that bloody Queen Mary used to say she feard his prayers 



PREVAILING PRAYER. 65 

more than all the armies of Europe. And events showed that 
she had reason to do it. He used to be in such an agony for 
the deliverence of his country that he could not sleep. He 
had a place in his garden where he used to go to pray. One 
night he and several friends were praying together, and as 
they prayed, Knox spoke and said that deliverance had come. 
He could not tell what had happened, but he felt that some- 
thing had taken place, for God had heard their prayers. 
What was it ? Why the next news they had was, that Mary 
was dead ! 

Take a fact which was related, in my hearing, by a minister. 
He said, that in a certain town there had been no revival for 
many years ; the church was nearly run out, the youth were 
all unconverted, and desolation reigned unbroken. There 
lived in a retired part of the town, an aged man, a blacksmith 
by trade, and of so stammering a tongue, that it was painful 
to hear him speak. On one Friday, as he was at work in his 
shop, alone, his mind became greatly exercised about the state 
of the church, and of the impenitent. His agony became so 
great, that he was induced to lay by his work, lock the shop 
door, and spend the afternoon in prayer. 

He prevailed, and on the Sabbath called on the minister, 
and desired him to appoint a conference meeting. After some 
hesitation, the minister consented, observing, however, that 
he feared but few would attend. He appointed it the same 
evening, at a large private house. When evening came, more 
assembled than could be accommodated in the house. All 
was silent for a time, until one sinner broke out in tears, and 
said, if any one could pray, he begged him to pray for him. 
Another followed, and another, and still another, until it was 
found that persons from every quarter of the town were 
under deep conviction. And what was remarkable was, that 
they all dated their conviction at the hour when the old man 
was praying in his shop. A powerful revival followed. Thus 
this old stammering man prevailed, and, as a prince, had 
power with God. I could name multitudes of similar cases, 
but, for want of time, must conclude with a few. 

REMARKS. 

1. A great deal of prayer is lost, and many people never 
prevail in prayer, because, when they have desires for particu- 
lar blessings, they dornot follow them up. They may have 
had desires, benevolent and pure, which were excited by the 
Spirit of God ; and when they have them, they should per- 



GQ PREVAILING PE\YEK. 

severe in prayer, for if they turn off their attention to other 
objects, they will quench the Spirit. We tell sinners not to 
turn off their minds from the one object, but to keep their 
attention fixed there, till they are saved. "When you find 
these holy desires in your minds, take care of two things : 

(1.) Do not quench the Spirit. 

(2.) Do not be diverted to other objects. 

Follow the leadings of the Spirit, till you have offered that 
effectual fervent prayer that availeth much. 

2. Without the spirit of prayer, ministers will do but little 
good. A minister need not expect much success, unless he 
prays for it. Sometimes others may have the spirit of prayer, 
and obtain a blessing on his labors. Generally, however, 
those preachers are the most successful who have the most of 
a spirit of prayer themselves. 

3. Not only must ministers have the spirit of prayer, but 
it is necessary that the church should unite in offering that 
effectual fervent prayer which can prevail with God. You 
need not expect a blessing, unless you ask for it. " For all 
these things will I be inquired of by the house of Israel, to 
do it" 

Now, my brethren, I have only to ask you, in regard to 
what I have preached to-night, " Will you do it ?" Have you 
done what I preached to you last Friday evening ? Have you 
gone over with your sins, and confessed them, and got them 
all out of the way? Can you pray now ? And will you join 
and offer prevailing prayer, that the Spirit of God may come 
down here ? 



LECTURE V. 



THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 



Text. — " Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire when ye pray, 
believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them."— Mark xi. 24. 

These words have been by some supposed to refer exclu- 
sively to the faith of miracles. But there is not the least evi- 
dence of this. That the text was not designed by our Sa- 
viour to refer exclusively to the faith of miracles, is proved 
by the connection in which it stands. If you read the chap- 
ter, you will see that Christ and his apostles were at this time 
very much engaged in their work, and very prayerful ; and 
as they returned from their places of retirement in the morn- 
ing, faint and hungry, they saw a fig-tree at a little distance. 
It looked very beautiful, and doubtless gave signs of having 
fruit on it ; but when they came nigh, they found nothing 
on it but leaves. And Jesus said, " No man eat fruit of thee 
hereafter for ever. 

" And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig- 
tree dried up from the roots. 

" And Peter, calling to remembrance, saith unto him, Mas- 
ter, behold the fig-tree which thou cursedst is withered away. 

" And Jesus answering, saith unto them, have faith in God. 

" For verily I say unto you, that whosoever shall say unto 
this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the 
sea ; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that 
those things which he saith shall come to pass ; he shall have 
whatsoever he saith." 

Then follow the words of the text : 

" Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire 
when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have 
them." 

Our Saviour was desirous of giving his disciples instructions 
respecting the nature and power of prayer, and the necessity 
of strong faith in God. He therefore stated a very strong- 
case, a miracle — one so great as the removal of a mountain 
into the sea. And he tells them, that if they exercise a proper 
faith in God, they might do such things. But his remarks 
are not to be limited to faith merely in regard to working mir- 
acles, for he goes on to say, 

(67) 



68 THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 

"And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have aught 
against any, that your Father also which is in heaven may 
forgive you your trespasses. 

" But if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father which 
is in heaven forgive you your trespasses." 

Does that relate to miracles ? When you pray, you must 
forgive. Is that required only when a man wishes to work a 
miracle ? There are many other promises in the Bible nearly 
related to this, and speaking nearly the same language, which 
have been all disposed of in this short-handed way, as refer- 
ring to the faith employed in miracles. Just as if the faith of 
miracles was something different from faith in God ! 

In my last lecture, I dwelt upon the subject of "prevailing 
prayer ;" and you will recollect that I passed over the subject 
of faith in prayer very briefly, because I wished to reserve it 
for a separate discussion. The subject to-night is, 

THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 

I propose, 

I. To show that faith is an indispensable condition of pre- 
vailing prayer. 

II. Show what it is that w^e are to believe when we pray. 
HI. Show when we are bound to exercise this faith, or to 

believe that we shall receive the thing that we ask for. 

IV. That this kind of faith in prayer always does obtain the 
blessing sought. 

V. Explain how we are to come into a state of mind, in 
which we can exercise such faith. 

VI. Answer several objections, which are sometimes alleged 
against these views of prayer. 

I. That faith is an indispensable condition of prevailing 
prayer, will not be seriously doubted. There is such a thing 
as offering benevolent desires, which are acceptable to God as 
such, that do not include the exercise of faith in regard to 
the actual reception of those blessings. But such desires are 
not prevailing prayer, the prayer of faith. God may see fit 
to grant the things desired, as an act of kindness and love, 
but it would not be properly in answer to prayer. I am speak- 
ing now of the kind of faith that insures the blessing. Do 
not understand me as saying that there is nothing in prayer 
that is acceptable to God, or that even obtains the blessing 
sometimes, without this kind of faith. But I am speaking of 
the faith which secures the very blessing it seeks. To prove 
that faith is indispensable to prevailing prayer, it is only ne- 



THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 69 

cessary to repeat what the apostle James expressly tells us : 
" If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to 
all men liberally, and upbraideth not ; and it shall be given him. 
But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that waver- 
eth is like a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed." 
II. We are to inquire ichat ice are to believe ichen ice pray. 

1. We are to believe in the existence of God — " He that 
cometh to God must believe that he is " — and in his willing- 
ness to answer prayer — " that he is, and that he is the reward- 
ear of them that diligently seek him." There are many who 
believe in the existence of God, and do not believe in the effi- 
cacy of prayer. They profess to believe in God, but deny the 
necessity or influence of prayer. 

2. We are to believe that ice shall receive — something — what ? 
Not something, or anything, as it happens, but some particu- 
lar thing we ask for. We are not to think that God is such 
a being, that if we ask a fish, he will give us a serpent, or if 
we ask bread, he will give us a stone. But he says, " What 
things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive 
them, and ye shall have them." With respect to the faith of 
miracles, it is plain that they were bound to believe they 
should receive just what they asked for — that the very thing 
itself should come to pass. That is what they were to be- 
lieve. Now what ought men to believe in regard to other 
blessings ? Is it a mere loose idea, that if a man prays for a 
specific blessing, God will by some mysterious sovereignty give 
something or other to him, or something to somebody else, 
somewhere ? When a jnan prays for his children's conversion, 
is he to believe that either his children will be converted, or 
somebody's else children, and it is altogether uncertain which ? 
All this is utter nonsense, and highly dishonorable to God. 
No, we are to believe that we shall receive the very things that 
we ask for. 

m. When are we bound to make this prayer? When 
are we bound to believe that we shall have the very things we 
pray for ? I answer, When we have evidence of it. Faith 
must always have evidence. A man cannot believe a thing, 
unless he sees something which he supposes to be evidence. 
He is under no obligation to believe, and has no right to be- 
lieve, a thing will be done, unless he has evidence. It is the 
height of fanaticism to believe without evidence. The kinds 
of evidence a man may have are the following : 

1. Suppose that God has especially promised the thing. As 
for instance, God says he is more ready to give his Holy 
Spirit to them that ask him, than parents are to give bread 



70 THE PRAYEH OF FAITH. 

to their children. Here we are bound to believe that we shall 
receive it when we pray for it. You have no right to put in 
an if, and say, "Lord, if it be thy ivitl, give us thy Holy 
Spirit." This is to insult God. To put an if into God's 
promise, where God has put none, is tantamount to charging 
God with being insincere. It is like saying, " O God, if thou 
art in earnest in making these promises, grant us the blessing 
we pray for." 

I heard of a case where a young convert was the means of 
teaching a minister a solemn truth on the subject of prayer. 
She was from a very wicked family, and went to live with a 
minister. While there, she was hopefully converted, and ap- 
peared well. One day she came to the minister's study, while 
he was in it- — a thing she was not in the habit of doing ; and 
he thought there must be something the matter. So he asked 
her to sit down, and kindly inquired into the state of her 
religious feelings ; she said, she was distressed at the man- 
ner in which the old church members prayed for the Spirit. 
They would pray for the Holy Spirit to come, and would 
seem to be very much in earnest, and plead the promises of 
God, and then say, " O Lord, if it be thy will, grant us these 
blessings for Christ's sake." She thought that saying, "if it 
be thy will," when God has expressly promised it, was ques- 
tioning whether God was sincere in his promises. The min- 
ister tried to reason her out of it, and of course he succeeded 
in confounding her. But she was distressed and filled with 
grief, and said, " I cannot argue the point with you, sir, but 
it is impressed on my mind that it is ^ong, and dishonoring 
God." And she went away weeping with anguish. The 
minister saw she was not satisfied, and it led him to look at 
the matter again, and finally he saw that it was putting in 
an if where God had put none, and where he had revealed his 
will expressly, and that it was an insult to God- And he went 
and told his church they were bound to believe that God was 
in earnest when he made them a promise. And the spirit of 
prayer came down upon that church, and a most powerful 
revival followed. 

2. Where there is a general promise in the Scriptures which 
you may reasonably apply to the particular case before you. 
If its real meaning includes the particular thing for which you 
pray, or if you can reasonably apply the principle of the 
promise to the case, there you have evidence. For instance, 
suppose it is a time when wickedness prevails greatly, and 
you are led to pray for God's interference ? What promise 
have you? Why, this one : "When the enemy shall come 



TPIE PRATER OF FAITH. 71 

in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard 
against him." Here you see is a general promise laying down 
a principle of God's administration, which you may apply to 
the case before you, as a warrant for exercising faith in prayer. 
And if the case come up, to inquire as to the time in which God 
will grant blessings in answer to prayer, you have this prom- 
ise : " While they are yet speaking, I will hear." 

There is a vast amount of general promises and principles 
laid down in the Bible, which Christians might make use of, 
if they would only think. "Whenever you are in circumstances 
to which the promises or principles apply, there you are to 
use them. A parent finds this promise : " The mercy of the 
Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear 
him, and his righteousness unto children's children, to such as 
keep his covenant, and to those that remember his com- 
mandments to do them." Now, here is a promise made to 
those that possess a certain character. If any parent is con- 
scious that this is his character, he has a rightful ground to 
apply it to hi m self and his family. If you have this character, 
you are bound to make use of this promise in prayer, and be- 
lieve it, even to your children's children. 

If I had time to-night, I could go from one end of the Bible 
to the other, and produce an astonishing variety of texts that 
are applicable as promises ; enough to prove, that in what- 
ever circumstances a child of God may be placed, God has 
provided in the Bible some promise, either general or partic- 
ular, which he can apply, that is precisely suited to his case. 
Many of God's promises are very broad on purpose to cover 
much ground. What can be broader than the promise in 
the text : " Whatsoever things ye desire when ye pray ?" 
What praying Christian is there who has not been surprised 
at the length, and breadth, and fullness, of the promises of 
God, when the Spirit has applied them to his heart ? Who 
that lives a life of prayer, has not wondered at his own blind- 
ness, in not having before seen and felt the extent of meaning 
and richness of those promises, when viewed under the light 
of the Spirit of God ? At such times he has been astonished 
at his own ignorance, and found the Spirit applying the 
promises and declarations of the Bible in a sense in which he 
had never dreamed of then being applicable before. The 
manner in which the apostles applied the promises, and 
prophecies, and declarations of the Old Testament, places in 
a strong light the breadth of meaning, and fullness, and rich- 
ness of the word of God. He that walks in the light of God's 
countenance, and is filled with the Spirit of God as he ought 



72 THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 

to be, will often make an appropriation of promises to him- 
self, and an application of them to his own circumstances, and 
the circumstances of those for whom he prays, that a blind 
professor of religion would never dream of. 

3. Where there is any prophetic declaration, that the thing 
prayed for is agreeable to the will of God. When it is plain 
from prophecy that the event is certainly to come, you are 
bound to believe it, and to make it the ground for your spe- 
cial faith in prayer. If the time is not specified in the Bible, 
and there is no evidence from other sources, you are not 
bound to believe that it shall take place now, or immediately. 
But if the time is specified, or if the time may be learned 
from the study of the prophecies, and it appears to have ar- 
rived, then Christians are under obligations to understand and 
apply it, by offering the prayer of faith. For instance, take 
the case of Daniel, in regard to the return of the Jews from 
captivity. What does he say? "I Daniel understood by 
books the number of the years whereof the word of the Lord 
came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he would accomplish 
seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem." Here he 
learned from books, that is, he studied his Bible, and in that 
way understood that the length of the captivity was to be 
seventy years. What does he do then ? Does he sit down 
upon the promise, and say, " God has pledged himself to put 
an end to the captivity in seventy years, and the time has ex- 
pired, and there is no need of doing any thing ?" Oh no ; Jie 
says, " And I set my face unto the Lord God, to seek by 
prayer and supplications, with fasting, and sackcloth, and 
ashes." He set himself at once to pray that the thing might 
be accomplished. He prayed in faith. But what was he to 
believe ? What he had learned from prophecy. There are 
many prophecies yet unfulfilled, in the Bible, which Chris- 
tians are bound to understand, as far as they are capable of 
understanding them, and then make them the basis of be- 
lieving prayer. Do not think, as some seem to, that be- 
cause a thing is foretold in prophecy it is not necessary to 
pray for it, or that it will come whether Christians pray for it 
or not. There is no truth in this. God says, in regard to 
this very class of events, which are revealed in prophecy, 
"Nevertheless, for all these things will I be inquired of by 
the house of Israel to do it for them." 

4 When the signs of the times, or the providence of God, 
indicate that a particular blessing is about to be bestowed, 
we are bound to believe it. The Lord JesuS Christ blamed 
the Jews, and called them hypocrites, because they did not 



THE PKAYER OF FAITH. 73 

understand the indications of Providence. They could un- 
derstand the signs of the weather, and see when it was about 
to rain, and v>ker> it would be fair weather ; but they could 
not see, from the signs of the times, that the time had come 
for the Messiah to appear, and build up the house of God. 
There are many professors of religion vrio are always stum- 
bling and hanging back, whenever any tl ^ug is proposed to 
be done. They always say, The time &| not come— the 
time has not come ; when there are oth^Swho pay atten- 
tion to the signs of the times, and who have^^^itual discern- 
ment to understand them. These pray :^fe.ith for the 
blessing, and it comes. ° 7 e 

5. When the Spiiit of God is upon you, and excites strong 
desires for any blessing, you are bound to pray for it in faith. 
You are bound to infer, from the fact that you find yourself 
drawn to desire such a thing while in the exercise of such 
holy affections as the Spirit of God produces, that these de- 
sires are the work of the Spirit. People are not apt to desire 
with the right kind of desires, unless they are excited by the 
Spirit of God. The apostle refers to these desires, excited by 
the Spirit, in his epistle to the Romans, where he says — 
" Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities, for we know 
not what we should pray for as we ought ; but the Sphit it- 
self maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot 
be uttered And he that searcheth the heart knoweth what 
is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for 
the saints, according to the will of God." Here, then, if you 
find yourself strongly drawn to desire a blessing, you are to 
understand it as an intimation that God is willing to bestow 
that particular blessing, and so you are bound to believe 
it. God does not trine with his children. He does not go 
and excite in them a desire for one blessing, to turn them 
off with something else. But he excites the very desires he is 
willing to gratify. And when they feel such desires, they are 
bound to follow them out till they get the blessing. 

IV. I will proceed to show that this kind of faith always ob- 
tains the object. The text is plain here, to show that you shall 
receive the very thing prayed for. It does not say, " Believe 
that ye shall receive, and ye shall either have that or some- 
thing else equivalent to it." To prove that this faith obtains 
the very blessing asked, I obse^re, 

1. That otherwise we could never know whether our pray- 
ers were answered. And we might continue praying and 
praying, long after the prayer was answered by some other 
blessing equivalent to the one we ask for. 
4 



74 THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 

2. If we are not bound to expect the very thing we ask for, 
it mfrst be that the Spirit of God deceives us. Wh^ should 
he excite US to desire a certain blessing, when lie means to 
grant something else ? 

3. What is the l^eapi^ig of this passage, "If a man ask 
bread, will he give him a stone ? " Does not our Saviour re- 
buke the idea thaf* prayer may be answered by giving some- 
thing else? WVSt encouragement have we to pray for any 
thing in partici -f e xr, if we are to ask for one thing and receive 
another ? Si ^ose a Christian should pray for a revival here 
— he would ? e 7 answered by a revival in China. Or he might 
pray for a Svival, and God would send the cholera, or an 
earthquake. All the history of the church shows that when 
God answers prayer, he gives his people the very thing for 
which their prayers are offered. God confers other blessings, 
on both saints and sinners, which they do not pray for at all. 
He' sends his rain both upon the just and the unjust. But 
when he answers prayer, it is by doing what they ask him to 
do. To be sure, he often more than answers prayer. He 
grants them not only what they ask, but often connects other 
blessings with it. 

4. Perhaps you may feel a difficulty here about the prayers 
of Jesus Christ. People may often ask, " Did not he pray in 
the garden for the cup to be removed, and was his prayer 
answered ? ** I answer that this is no difficulty at all, for the 
prayer was answered. The cup he prayed to be delivered 
from was removed. This is what the apostle refers to, when 
he says — " Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered 
up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears 
unto him that was able to save him from death, was heard in 
that he feared." Now I ask, On what occasion was he saved 
from death, if not on this ? Was it the death of the cross 
he prayed to be delivered from ? Not at all. But the case 
was this. A short time before he was betrayed, we hear him 
saying to his disciples, " My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, 
even unto death." Anguish of mind came rolling in upon 
him, till he was just ready to die, and he went out into a gar- 
den to pray, and told his disciples to watch, and then he went 
by himself and prayed ; "O my Father," said he, "if it. be 
possible, let this cup pass from me ; nevertheless not as I will, 
but as thou wilt." In his ag<JHy he rose from his knees, and 
walked the garden, till he came where his disciples were, and 
there he saw them fast asleep. He awaked them and said, 
" What, could ye not watch with me one hour ? " And then 
he went again, for he was in such distress that he could not 



THE PRAYER OE EA1TH. 



stand still, and again he poured out his soul. And the third 
time he goes away and prays, " Father, if thou be willing, 
remove this cup from me ; nevertheless, not my will, but thine 
be done." And now the third time of praying, there appear- 
ed an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening him. And 
his mind became composed, and calm, and the cup was gone. 
Till then, he had been in such an agony that his Sweat was as 
it were great drops*of blood, but now it was all over. 

Some have supposed that he was praying against the cross, 
and begging to be delivered from dying on lie cross ! Did 
Christ ever shrink from the cross ? Never. He came into 
the world on purpose to die on the cross, and he never shrunk 
from it. But he was afraid he should die in the garden be- 
fore he came to the cross. The burden on his soul was so 
great, and produced such an agony, that he felt as if he was 
on the point of dying. His soul was sorrowful even unto 
death. But after the angel appeared unto him, wjg hear no 
more of his agony of souL He had prayed for relief from 
that cup, and his prayer was answered. He became calm, 
and had no more mental suffering till just as he expired. 
This case, therefore, is no exception. He received the very 
thing for which he asked, as he says, " I knew thou always 
hearest me," 

But there is another case often brought up, where the apos- 
tle Paul prayed against the thorn in the flesh. He says, " I 
besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me." 
And God answered him, " My grace is sufficient for thee." 
It is the opinion of Dr. Clarke and others, that Paul's prayer 
was answered in the very thing for which he prayed. That 
" the thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan," of which 
he speaks, was a false apostle who had distracted and per- 
verted the church at Corinth. That Paul prayed against his 
influence, and the Lord answered him by assuring him, " My 
grace is sufficient for thee." Who does not know that it was, 
and that Paul's influence ultimately triumphed ? 

But admitting that Paul's prayer was not answered by 
granting the particular thing for which he prayed, in order 
to make out this case as an exception to the prayer of faith, 
they are obliged to assume the very thing to be proved ; and 
that is, that the apostle prayed in faith. There is no reason to 
suppose that Paul would always pray in faith, any more than 
that any other Christian does. The very manner in which 
God answered him shows that it was not in faith. He virtu- 
ally tells him, " That thorn is necessary for your sanctifica- 
tion, and to keep you from being exalted above measure. I 



76 THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 

sent it upon you in love, and in faithfulness, and you have 
no business to pray that I should take it away. — LET IT 
ALONE." 

There is not only no evidence that he prayed in faith, but 
a strong presumption that he did not. From the history it 
is evident that he had nothing on which to repose faith. 
There was n6 express promise, no general promise, that could 
be applicable, no providence of God, no prophecy, no teach- 
ing of the Spirit that God would remove this thorn ; but the 
presumption was that God would not remove it. He had 
given it to him for a particular purpose. His prayer appears 
to have been selfish, or at least praying against a mere per- 
sonal influence. This was not any personal suffering that re- 
tarded his usefulness, but on the contrary it was given him 
to increase his usefulness by keeping him humble ; and be- 
cause on some account he found it inconvenient and mortify- 
ing, he set himself to pray out of his own heart, evidently 
without being led to it by the Spirit of God, But did Paul 
pray in faith without the Spirit of God, any more than any 
other man? And will any one undertake to say that the 
Spirit of God led him to pray that this might be removed, 
when God himself had given it for a particular purpose, which 
purpose could not be answered only as the thorn continued 
with him ? 

Why then is this made an exception to the general rule 
laid down in the text, that a man shall receive whatsoever he 
asks in faith ? I was once amazed and grieved at a public 
examination at a Theological Seminary, to hear them darken 
counsel by words without knowledge on this subject. This 
case of Paul, and that of Christ just adverted to, were both 
of them cited as instances to prove to their students that the 
prayer of faith would not be answered in the particular thing 
for which they prayed. Now to teach such sentiments as these 
in or out of a Theological Seminary, is to trifle with the word 
of God, and to break the power of the Christian ministry. 
Has it come to this, that our grave doctors in our seminaries, 
are employed to instruct Zion's watchmen, to believe and 
teach that it is not to be expected that the prayer of faith is 
to be answered in granting the object for which we pray ? Oh, 
tell it not in Gath, nor let the sound reach Askelon ! What is 
to become of the church while such are the views of its grav- 
est and most influential ministers ? I would not be unkind 
nor censorious, but as one of the ministers of Jesus Christ, I 
feel bound to bear testimony against such a perversion of the 
word of God. 



THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 77 

5. It is evident that the prayer of faith will obtain the 
blessing, from the fact that our faith rests on evidence that to 
grant that thing is the will of God. Not evidence that some- 
thing else will be granted, but that this particular thing will 
be. But how, then, can we have evidence that this thing will 
be granted, if another thing is to be granted ? People often 
receive more than they pray for. Solomon prayed for wisdom, 
and God granted him riches and honor in addition. So a 
wife sometimes prays for the conversion of her husband, and 
if she offers the prayer, of faith, God may not only grant that 
blessing, but convert her child, and her whole family. Bless- 
ings sometimes seem to hang together, so that if a Christian 
gains one he gets them all. 

V. I am to show how we are to come into this state of 
mind, in which we can offer such prayer. People sometimes 
ask, " How shall I offer such prayer ? Shall I say, Now I 
will pray in faith for such and such a blessing ? " No, the 
human mind is not moved in this way. You might just as 
well say, " Now I will call up a spirit from the bottomless pit." 
I answer, 

1. You must first obtain evidence that God will bestow the 
blessing. How did Daniel make out to offer the prayer of 
faith ? He searched the Scriptures. Now, you need not let 
your Bible he on a shelf, and expect God to reveal his prom- 
ises to you. Search the Scriptures, and see where you can get 
either a general or special promise, or a prophecy, on which 
you can plant your feet when you pray. Go through the 
Bible, and you will find it full of such things — precious prom- 
ises, which you may plead in faith. You never need to want 
for objects of prayer, if you will do as Daniel did. Persons 
are staggered on this subject, because they never make a prop- 
er use of the Bible. 

A curious case occurred in one of the towns in the western 
part of this State. There was a revival there. A certain cler- 
gyman came to visit the place, and heard a great deal said 
about the Prayer of Faith. He was staggered at what they 
said, for he had never regarded the subject in the light they 
did. He inquired about it of the minister that was laboring 
there. The minister requested him, in a kind spirit, to go 
home, and take his Testament, look out the passages that re- 
fer to prayer, and go round to his most praying people, and 
ask them how they understood these passages. He said he 
would do it, for though these views were new to him, he was 
willing to learn. He did it, and went to his praying men and 
women, and read the passages without note or comment, and 



78 THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 

asked what they thought. He found their plain common 
sense had led them to understand these passages, and to be- 
lieve that they mean just as they say. This affected him, and 
then the fact of his going round and presenting the promises 
before their minds awakened the spirit of prayer in them, and 
a revival followed. 

I could name many individuals who have set themselves to 
examine the Bible on this subject, and before they got half 
through with it have been filled with the spirit of prayer. 
They found that God meant by his promises just what a plain, 
common sense man would understand them to mean. I ad- 
vise you to try it. You have Bibles ; look them over, and 
whenever you find a promise that you can use, fasten it in 
your mind before you go on ; and I venture to predict you 
will not get through the book without finding out that God's 
promises mean just what they say. 

2. Cherish the good desires you have. Christians very often 
lose their good desires by not attending to this ; and then 
their prayers are mere words, without any desire or earnest- 
ness at all. The least longing of desire must be cherished. 
If your body was likely to freeze, and you had even the least 
spark of fire, how you would cherish it ! So if you have the 
least desire for a blessing, let it be ever so small, don't trifle 
it away. Do not grieve the Spirit. Do not be diverted. Do 
not lose good desires by levity, by censoriousness, by worldly- 
mindedness. Watch and pray, and follow it up, or you will 
never pray the prayer of faith. 

2. Entire consecration to God is indispensable to the prayer of 
faith. You must live a holy life, and consecrate all to God — 
your time, talents, influence — all you have, and all you are, to 
be his entirely. Bead the lives of pious men, and you will be 
struck with this fact : that they used to set apart times to re- 
new their covenant, and dedicate themselves anew to God ; 
and whenever they have done so, a blessing has always fol- 
lowed immediately. If I had Edwards here to-night, I could 
read passages showing how it was in his days. 

4. You must persevere. You are not to pray for a thing 
once, and then cease, and call that the prayer of faith. Look 
at Daniel. He prayed twenty-one days, and did not cease till 
he had obtained the blessing. He set his heart and his face 
unto the Lord, to seek by prayer and supplications, with fast- 
ing, and sackcloth, and ashes : and he held on three weeks, 
and then the answer came. And why did not it come before ? 
God sent an Archangel to bear the message, but the devil 
hindered him all this time. See what Christ says in the par- 



THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 79 

able of tlie unjust judge, and the parable of tlie loaves. What 
does he teach us b y them ? Why, that God will grant an- 
swers to prayer when it is importunate. " Shall not God 
avenge his own elect, who cry day and night unto him t n 

5. If you would pray in faith, be sure to walk every day with 
God. If you do, he will tell you what to pray for. Be filled 
with his Spirit, and he will give you objects enough to pray 
for. He will give you as much of the spirit of prayer as you 
have strength of body to bear. 

Said a good man to me, " Oh, I am dying for the want of 
strength to pray. My body is crushed, the world is on me, 
and how can I forbear praying!" I have known that man go 
to bed absolutely sick, for weakness and faintness, under the 
pressure. And I have known him pray as if he would do vio- 
lence to heaven, and then seen the blessing come as plainly 
in answer to his prayer as if it was revealed, so that no person 
would doubt it any more than if God had spoken from heaven. 
Shall I tell you how he died ? He prayed more and more, 
and he used to take the map of the world before him and 
pray, and look over the different countries and pray for them, 
till he absolutely expired in his room praying. Blessed man ! 
He was the reproach of the ungodly and of carnal, unbeliev- 
ing professors, but he was the favorite of heaven, and a pre- 
vailing prince in prayer. 

VI. I will refer to some objections which are brought for- 
ward against this doctrine. 

1. " It leads to fanaticism and amounts to a new revela- 
tion." Why should this be a stumbling block? They must 
have evidence to believe before they can offer the prayer of 
faith. And if God gives other evidence besides the senses, 
where is the objection ? True, there is a sense in which this 
is a new revelation ; it is making known a thing by his Spirit. 
But it is the very revelation which God has promised to give. 
It is just the one we are to expect, if the Bible is true ; that 
when we know not what we ought to pray for, according to 
the will of God, his Spirit helps our infirmities, and teaches 
us the very thing to pray for. Shall we deny the teaching of 
the Spirit ? 

2. It is often asked, " Is it our duty to pray the prayer of 
faith for the salvation of all men ?" I answer, No ; for that 
is not a thing according to the will of God. It is directly 
contrary to his revealed will We have no evidence that all 
will be saved. We should feel benevolently to all, and, in 
itself considered, desire their salvation. But God has revealed 
it to us that many of the human race shall be damned. x\nd 



80 THE PRATER OF FAITH. 

it cannot be a duty to believe that tliey shall all be saved, in 
the face of a revelation to the contrary. In Christ's prayer, 
in the seventeenth chapter of John, he expressly said, " I pray 
not for the world but for those thou hast given me." 

8. But say some, "If we were to offer this prayer for all 
men, would not all men be saved ?" I answer, Yes, and so 
they would be saved, if they would all repent. But they will 
not. Neither will Christians offer the prayer of faith for all, 
because there is no evidence on which to ground a belief that 
God intends to save all men. 

4. But you ask, " For whom are we to offer this prayer ? 
We want to know in what cases, for what persons, and places, 
and at what times, etc., we are to make the prayer of faith." 
I answer, as I have already answered, When you have evi- 
dence, from promises, or prophecies, or providences, or the 
leadings of the Spirit, that God will do the things you pray 
for. 

5. " How is it that so many prayers of pious parents for 
their children are not answered ? Did you not say there was 
a promise which pious parents may apply to their children ? 
Why is it, then, that so many pious praying parents have had 
impenitent children, that died in their sins ?" Granted that 
it is so, what does it prove ? Let God be true, but every man 
a liar. Which shall we believe, that God's promise has failed, 
or that these parents did not do their duty ? Perhaps they 
did not believe the promise, or did not believe there was any 
such thing as the prayer of faith. Wherever you find a pro- 
fessor that does not believe in any such prayer, you find, as a 
general thing, that he has children and domestics yet in their 
sins. And no wonder, unless they are converted in answer 
to the prayers of somebody else. 

6. "Will not these views lead to fanaticism? Will not 
many people think they are offering the prayer of faith 
when they are not ?" That is the same objection that the 
Unitarians make against the doctrine of regeneration — that 
many people think they have been born again when they have 
not. It is an argument against all spiritual religion whatever. 
Some think they have it when they have not, and are fanatics. 
But there are those who know what the prayer of faith is, just 
as there are those who know what spiritual experience is, 
though it may stumble cold-hearted professors who know it 
not. Even ministers often lay themselves open to the rebuke 
which Christ gave to Nicodemus : " Art thou a master in Is- 
rael, and knowesb not these things ?" 



THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 81 



REMARKS. 



1. Persons who have not known by experience what this is, 
have great reason to doubt their piety. This is by no means 
uncharitable. Let them examine themselves. It is to be 
feared that they understand prayer as Nicodemus did the 
new birth. They have not walked with God, and you cannot 
describe it to them, any more than you can describe a beauti- 
ful painting to a blind man who cannot see colors. Many 
professors can understand about the prayer of faith just as 
much as a blind man does of colors. 

2. There is reason to believe millions are in hell because 
professors have not offered the prayer of faith. When they 
had promises under their eye, they have not had faith enough 
to use them. Thus parents let their children, and even bap- 
tized children, go down to hell because they would not believe 
the promises of God. Doubtless many women's husbands 
have gone to hell, when they might have prevailed with God 
in prayer and saved them. The signs of the times and the 
indications of Providence were favorable, perhaps, and the 
Spirit of God prompted desires for then' salvation, and they 
had evidence enough to believe that God was ready to grant 
a blessing, and if they had only prayed in faith, God would 
have granted it ; but God turned it away because they would 
not discern the signs of the times. 

3. You say, " This leaves the church under a great load of 
guilt." True, it does so ; and no doubt multitudes will stand 
up before God covered all over with the blood of souls that 
have been lost through their want of faith. The promises of 
God, accumulated in their Bibles, will stare them in the face 
and weigh them down to hell. 

4. Many professors of religion live so far from God that to 
talk to them about the prayer of faith is all unintelligible. 
Very often the greatest offence possible to them is to preach 
about this kind of prayer. 

5. I want to ask the professors who are here a few ques- 
tions. Do you know what it is to pray in faith ? Did you 
ever pray in this way ? Have you ever prayed till your mind 
was assured the blessing would come — till you felt that rest 
in God, that confidence, as perfect as if you saw God come 
down from heaven to give it to you ? If not, you ought to 
examine your foundation. How can you live without praying 
in faith at all ? How do you live in view of your children, 
while you have no assurance whatever that they will be con- 

4* 



82 THE PRAYER OF FAITH. 

verted ? One would think you would go deranged. I knew 
a father at the West ; he was a good man, but he had erro- 
neous views respecting the prayer of faith ; and his whole 
family of children were grown up and not one of them con- 
verted. At length his son sickened and seemed about to die. 
The father prayed, but the son grew worse and seemed sink- 
ing into the grave without hope. The father prayed till his 
anguish was unutterable. He went at last and prayed — (there 
seemed no prospect of his son's life) — but he poured out his 
soul as if he would not be denied, till at length he got an as- 
surance that his son would not only live, but be converted ; 
and not only this one, but his whole family, would be converted 
to God. He came into the house and told his family his son 
would not die. They were astonished at him. " I tell you," 
says he, " he won't die. And no child of mine will ever die 
in his sins." That man's children were all converted years 
ago. 

What do you think of that ? Was that fanaticism ? If you 
believe so, it is because you know nothing about the matter. 
Do you pray so ? Do you live in such a manner that you can 
offer such prayer for your children ? I know that the chil- 
dren of professors may sometimes be converted in answer to 
the prayers of somebody else. But ought you to live so ? 
Dare you trust to the prayers of others when God calls you 
to sustain this most important relation to your children ? 

Finally — See what combined effort is made to dispose of 
the Bible. The wicked are for throwing away the threaten- 
ings of the Bible, and the church the promises. And what is 
there left ? Between them, they leave the Bible a blank. I 
say it in love : What are our Bibles good for if we do not lay 
hold on their precious promises, and use them as the ground 
of our faith when we pray for the blessing of God ? You had 
better send your Bibles to the heathen, where they will do 
some good, if you are not going to believe and use them. I 
have no evidence that there is much of this prayer now in this 
church or in this city. And what will become of it ? What 
will become of your children ? your neighbors ? the wicked ? 



LECTUBE VI. 



SPIRIT OF PKAYEK. 

Text.— Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities : for we know not what we 
should pray for as we ought ; but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with 
groanings which cannot be uttered. And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what 
is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints, according to 
the will of God.— Romans viii. 26, 27. 

My last lecture but one was on the subject of Effectual 
Prayer ; in which I observed that one of the most important 
attributes of effectual or prevailing prayer is Faith. This was 
so extensive a subject that I reserved it for a separate discus- 
sion. And accordingly, I lectured last Friday evening on the 
subject of Faith in Prayer, or, as it is termed, the Prayer of 
Faith. It was my intention to discuss the subject in a single 
lecture. But as I was under the necessity of condensing so 
much on some points, it occurred to me, and was mentioned 
by others, that there might be some questions which people 
would ask, that ought to be answered more fully, especially 
as the subject is one on which there is so much darkness. 
One grand design in preaching is to exhibit the truth in such 
a way as to answer the questions which would naturally arise 
in the minds of those who read the Bible with attention, and 
who want to know what it means, so that they can put it in 
practice. In explaining the text, I propose to show, 

I. What Spirit is here spoken of, " The Spirit also helpeth 
our infirmities." 

II. What that Spirit does for us. 

HE. Why he does what the text declares him to do. 

IV. How he accomplishes it. 

V. The degree in which he influences the minds of those 
who are under his influence. 

VL How his influences are to be distinguished from the 
influences of evil spirits, or from the suggestions, of our own 
minds. 

VII. How we are to obtain this agency Q f the Holy Spirit 

VHI. Who have a right to expect to enjoy his influences in 
this matter-^or for whom the Spirit does the things spoken 
of in the text. 

I, What Spirit is it that is spoken of in the text ? 

(83) 



84 SPIRIT OF PRATER. 

Some have supposed that the Spirit spoken of in the text 
means our own spirit — our own mind. But a little attention 
to the text will show plainly that this is not the meaning. 
" The Spirit helpeth our infirmities" would then read, " Our 
own spirit helpeth the infirmities of our own spirit/' — and 
"Our owtl spirit likewise maketh intercession for our own 
spirit. 5 ' You see you can make no sense of it on that suppo- 
sition. It is evident from the manner in which the text is 
introduced, that the Spirit referred to is the Holy Ghost. 
" For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die : but if ye through 
the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For 
as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of 
God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again 
to fear ; but ye have received the spirit of adoption, whereby 
we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with 
our spirit, that we are the children of God." And the text is 
plainly speaking of the same Spirit. 

II. What the Spirit does. 

Answer — He intercedes for the saints. " He maketh inter- 
cession for us," and "helpeth our infirmities," when "we 
know not what to pray for as we ought." He helps Chris- 
tians to pray according to the will of God, or for the things 
that God desires them to pray for. 

HI. Why is the Holy Spirit thus employed ? 

Because of our ignorance. Because we know not what we 
should pray for as we ought. We are so ignorant both of 
the will of God, revealed in the Bible, and of his unrevealed 
will, as we ought to leam it from his providence. Mankind 
are vastly ignorant both of the promises and prophecies of 
the Bible, and blind to the providence of God. And they 
are still more in the dark about those points of which God 
has said nothing but by the leadings of his Spirit. You re- 
collept that I named these four sources of evidence on which 
to ground faith in prayer — promises, prophecies, providences, 
and the Holy Spirit. When all other means fail of leading 
us to the knowledge of what we ought to pray for, the Spirit 
does it. 

IV. How does he make intercession for the saints? In 
what mode does he operate, so as to help -our infirmities? 

Not by superseding the use of our faculties. It is not by 
praying for us, while we do nothing. He prays for us, by ex- 
citing our* own faculties. Not that he immediately suggests to 
us words, or guides our language. But he enlightens our 
minds, and makes the truth take hold of our souls. He leads 
us to consider the state of the church, and the condition of 



SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 85 

sinners around us. The manner in which he brings the truth 
before the mind, and keeps it there till it produces its effect, 
we cannot tell. But we can know as much as this — that he 
leads us to a deep consideration of the state of things ; and 
the result of this, the natural and philosophical result, is, 
deep feeling. When the Spirit brings the truth up before a 
man's mind, there is only one way in which he can keep from 
deep feeling. That is, by turning away his thoughts, and 
leading his mind to think of other things. Sinners, when 
the Spirit of God brings the truth before them, must feel. 
They feel wrong, as long as they remain impenitent. So, if 
a man is a Christian, and the Holy Spirit brings a subject 
into warm contact with his heart, it is just as impossible he 
should not feel, as it is that your hand should not feel if you 
put it into the fire. If the Spirit of God leads him to dwell 
on things calculated to excite warm and "overpowering feel- 
ings, and he is not excited by them, it proves that he has no 
love for souls, nothing of the Spirit of Christ, and knows 
nothing about Christian experience. 

2. The Spirit makes the Christian feel the value of souls, 
and the guilt and danger of sinners in their present condition. 
It is amazing how dark and stupid Christians often are about 
this. Even Christian parents let their children go right 
down to hell before their eyes, and scarcely seem to exercise 
a single feeling, or put forth an effort to save them. And 
why ? Because they are so blind to w^hat hell is, so unbeliev- 
ing about the Bible, so ignorant of the precious promises 
which God has made to faithful parents. They grieve the 
Spirit of God away, and it «is in vain to try to make them 
pray for their children, while the Spirit of God is away from 
them. 

3. He leads Christians to understand and apply the prom- 
ises of Scripture. ' It is wonderful that in no age have Chris- 
tians been able fully to apply the promises of Scripture to 
the events of life, as they go along. This is not because the 
promises themselves are obscure. The promises themselves 
are plain enough. But there has always been a wonderful 
disposition to overlook the Scriptures, as a source of light 
respecting the passing events of life. How astonished the 
apostles were at Christ's application of so many prophecies 
to himself ! They seemed to be continually ready to exclaim, 
" Astonishing ! Can it be so ? We nev^r understood it be- 
fore." Who, that has witnessed the manner in which the 
apostles, influenced and inspired by the Holy Ghost, applied 
passages of the Old Testament to gospel times, has not been 



86 SPIRIT OF PKAYEK. 

amazed at the richness of meaning which they found in the 
Scriptures ? So it has been with many a Christian ; while 
deeply engaged in prayer, he has seen that passages of 
Scripture are appropriate which he never thought of before, 
as having any such application. 

I once knew an individual who was in great spiritual dark- 
ness. He had retired for prayer, resolved that he would not 
desist till he had found the Lord. He kneeled down and 
tried to pray. All was dark, and he could not pray. He 
rose from his knees, and stood a while, but he could not give 
it up, for he had promised that he would not let the sun go 
down before he had given himself to God. He knelt again, 
but it was all dark, and his heart was hard as before. He 
was nearly in despair, and said in agony, " I have grieved 
the Spirit of God away, and there is no promise for me. I 
am shut out from the presence of God." But his resolution 
was formed not to give over, and again he knelt down. He 
had said but a few words, when this passage came into his 
mind as fresh as if he had just read it ; it seemed as if he 
had just been reading the words, " Ye shall seek me, and find 
me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart." Jer. 
xxix. 13. Though this promise was in the Old Testament, 
and was addressed to the Jews, it was still as applicable to 
him as to them. And it broke his heart, like the hammer of 
the Lord, in a moment. He prayed, and rose up, happy in 
God. Thus it often happens when professors of religion are 
praying for their children. Sometimes they pray, and are in 
darkness and doubt, feeling as if there was no foundation for 
faith, and no special promises for the children of believers. 
But while they are pleading, God has shown them the full 
meaning of some promise, and their soul has rested on it as 
on the mighty arm of God. I once heard of a widow who 
was greatly exercised about her children, till this passage 
was brought powerfully to her mind : " Leave thy fatherless 
children with me, I will preserve them alive." She saw it 
had an extended meaning, and she was enabled to lay hold 
on it, as it were, with her hands ; and then she prevailed in 
prayer, and her children were converted. The Holy Spirit 
was sent into the world by the Saviour, to guide his people and 
instruct them, and bring things to their remembrance, as well 
as to convince the world of sin. 

4 The Spirit leads Christians to desire and pray for things 
of which nothing is specifically said in the word of God. 
Take the case of an individual. That God is willing to save 
is a general truth. So it is a general truth that he is willing 



SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 87 

to answer prayer. But how shall I know the will of God 
respecting that individual, whether I can pray in faith accord- 
ing to the will of God for the conversion and salvation of 
that individual, or not ? Here the agency of the Spirit conies 
in, to lead the minds of God's people to pray for those in- 
dividuals, and at those times, when God is prepared to bless 
them. When w 7 e know not what to pray for, the Holy Spirit 
leads the mind to dwell on some object, to consider its situa- 
tion, to realize its value, and to feel for it, and pray, and 
travail in birth, till the object is attained. This sort of expe- 
rience I know is less common in cities than it is in some parts 
of the country, because of the infinite number of things to 
divert the attention and grieve the Spirit in cities. I have 
had much opportunity to know how it has been in some 
sections. I was acquainted with an individual who used to 
keep a list of persons that he was specially concerned for ; 
and I have had the opportunity to know a multitude of per- 
sons for whom he became thus interested, who were imme- 
diately converted. I have seen him pray for persons on his 
list, when he was literally in an agony for them ; and have 
sometimes known him call on some other person to help him 
pray for such a one. I have known his mind to fasten on an 
individual of hardened, abandoned character, and who could 
not be reached in any ordinary way. In a town in the north 
part of this State, where there was a revival, there was a cer- 
tain individual who was a most violent and outrageous op- 
poser. He kept a tavern, and used to delight in swearing at 
a desperate rate, whenever there were Christians within hear- 
ing, on purpose to hurt their feelings. He was so bad, that 
one man said he believed he should have to sell his place, or 
give it away, and move out of town, for he could not live near 
a man that swore so. This good man, that I was speaking 
of, was passing through the town, and heard of the case, 
and was very much grieved and distressed for the individual. 
He took him on his praying list. • The case weighed on his 
mind, when he was asleep and when he was awake. He 
kept thinking about him, and praying for him for days. 
And the first we knew of it, this ungodly man came into a 
meeting, and got up and confessed his sins, and poured out 
his souL His bar-room immediately became the place where 
they held prayer meetings. In this manner the Spirit of God 
leads individual Christians to pray for things which they would 
not pray for, unless they were led by the Spirit. And thus 
they pray for things according to the will of God. 

By some, this may be said to be a revelation from God. I 



88 SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 

do not doubt that great evil lias been done by saying that 
this kind of influence amounts to a new revelation. And 
many people will be afraid of it if they hear it called a new 
revelation, so that they will not stop to inquire what it means, 
or whether the Scriptures teach it or not. They suppose it 
to be a complete answer to the idea. But the plain truth of 
the matter is, that the Spirit leads a man to pray. And if 
God leads a man to pray for an individual, the inference from 
the Bible is, that God designs to save that individual. If we 
find by comparing our state of mind with the Bible, that we 
are led by the Spirit to pray for an individual, we have good 
evidence to believe that God is prepared to bless him. 

6. By giving to Christians a spiritual discernment respect- 
ing the movements and developments of Providence. De- 
voted, praying Christians often see these things so clearly, 
and look so far ahead, as greatly to stumble others. They 
sometimes almost seem to prophesy. No doubt persons may 
be deluded, and sometimes are so, by leaning to their own 
understanding when they think they are led by the Spirit. 
But there is no doubt that a Christian may be made to see 
and to discern clearly the signs of the times, so as to under- 
stand, by providence, what to expect, and thus to pray for it 
in faith. Thus they are often led to expect a revival, and to 
pray for it in faith, when nobody else can see the least signs of it. 

There was a woman in New Jersey, in a place where there 
had been a revival. She was very positive there was going to 
be another. She insisted upon it that they had had the for- 
mer rain, and were now going to have the latter rain. She 
wanted to have conference meetings appointed. But the 
minister and elders saw nothing to encourage it, and would 
do nothing. She saw they were blind, and so she went for- 
ward and got a carpenter to make seats for her, for she said 
she would have meetings in her own house. There was cer- 
tainly going to be a revival. She had scarcely opened her 
doors for meetings, before? the Spirit of God came down in 
great power. And these sleepy church members found them- 
selves surrounded all at once with convicted sinners, And 
they could only say, " Surely the Lord was in this place, and 
we knew it not." The reason why such persons understand 
the indication of God's will is not because of the superior 
wisdom that is in them, but because the Spirit of God 
leads them to see the signs of the times. And this, not 
by revelation; but they are led to see that converging of pro- 
vidences to a single point, which produces in them a confident 
expectation of a certain result. 



SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 89 

V. In what degree are we to expect the Spirit of God to 
affect the ♦minds of believers ? The text says, " The Spirit 
maketh intercession with groanings that cannot be uttered. 55 
The meaning of this I understand to be, that the Spirit ex- 
cites desires too great to be uttered except by groans. Some- 
thing that language cannot utter — making the soul too full to 
utter its feelings by words, where the person can only groan 
them out to God, who understands the language of the heart. 

VL How are we to know whether it is the Spirit of God 
that influences our minds or not ? 

1. Not by feeling that some external influence or agency is 
applied to us. We are not to expect to feel our minds in di- 
rect physical contact with God. If such a thing can be, we 
know of no way in which it can be made sensible. We know 
that we exercise our minds freely, and that our thoughts are 
exercised on something that excites our feelings. But we 
are not to expect a miracle to be wrought, as if we were led 
by the hand, sensibly, or like something whispered in the ear, 
or any miraculous manifestation of the will of God. People 
often grieve the Spirit away, because they do not harbor him 
and cherish his influences. Sinners often do this ignorantly. 
They suppose that if they were under conviction by the Spirit, 
they should have such and such mysterious feelings, a shock 
would come upon them, which they could not mistake. Many 
Christians are so ignorant of the Spirit's influences, and have 
thought so little about having his assistance in prayer, that 
when they have them they do not know it, and so do not 
cherish, and yield to them, and preserve them. We are con- 
scious of nothing hi the case, only the movement of our own 
minds. There is nothing else that can be felt. We are mere- 
ly aware that our thoughts are intensely employed on a cer- 
tain subject. Christians are often unnecessarily misled and 
distressed on this point, for fear they have not the Spirit of 
God. They feel intensely, but they know not what makes 
them feel. They are distressed about sinners ; but why 
should they not be distressed, when they think of their condi- 
tion ? They keep thinking about them all the time, and why 
shouldn't they be distressed ? Now, the truth is, that the 
very fact that you are thinking upon them is evidence that the 
Spirit of God is leading you. Do you not know that the 
greater part of the time these things do not affect you so ? 
The greater part of the time you do not think much about 
the case of sinners. You know that then salvation is always 
equally important. But at other times, even when you are 
quite at leisure, your mind is entirely dark, and vacant of any 



90 SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 

feeling for them. But now, although you may be busy about 
other things, you think, you pray, and feel intensely for 
them, even while you are about business that at other times 
would occupy all your thoughts. Now, almost every thought 
you have is, "God have mercy on them." Why is this? Why, 
their case is placed in a strong light before your mind. Do 
you ask what it is that leads your mind to exercise benevo- 
lence for sinners, and to agonize in prayer for them ? What 
can it be but the Spirit of God ? There are no devils that 
would lead you so. If your feelings are truly benevolent, you 
are to consider it as the Holy Spirit leading you to pray for 
things according to the will of God. 

2. Try the spirits by the Bible. People are sometimes 
led away by strange fantasies and crazy impulses. If you 
compare them faithfully with the Bible, you never need be 
led astray. You can always know whether your feelings are 
produced by the Spirit's influences, by comparing your de- 
sires with the spirit and temper of religion as described in 
the Bible. The Bible commands you to try the spirits. 
" Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits, whether 
they be of God." Observe not only your feelings in regard to 
your fellow-men, but also, and more especially, the teachings 
of the Spirit within you respecting our Lord Jesus Christ. 
" Hereby know ye the Spirit of God. Every spirit that con- 
fesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God. And 
every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in 
the flesh is not of God ; and this is that spirit of Antichrist 
whereof ye have heard that it shall come ; and even now 
already it is in the world." 

Vn. How shall we get this influence of the Spirit of God ? 
• 1. It must be sought by fervent, believing prayer. Christ 
says, " If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to 
your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father 
give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him !" Does any one 
say, I have prayed for him, and he does not come ? It is be- 
cause you do not pray aright " Ye ask and receive not, be- 
cause ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts." 
You do not pray from right motives. A professor of re- 
ligion, and a principal member in a church, once asked a min- 
ister what he thought of his case ; he had been praying week 
after week for the Spirit, and had not received him. The 
minister asked him what his motive was in praying. He said 
he wanted to be happy. He knew those who had the Spirit 
were happy, and he w T anted to enjoy his mind as they did. 
Why, the devil himself might pray so. That is mere selfish- 



SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 91 

ness. The man turned away in anger. He saw that he had 
never known what it was to pray. He was convinced he was 
a hypocrite, and that his prayers were all selfish, dictated only 
by a desire for his own happiness. David prayed that God 
would uphold him by his free Spirit, that he might teach 
transgressors and turn sinners to God, A Christian should 
pray for the Spirit that he may be the more useful and 
glorify God more ; not that he himself may be more happy. 
This man saw clearly where he had been in error, and he 
was converted. Perhaps many here have been just so. 
You ought to examine and see if all your prayers are not 
selfish. 

2. Use the means adapted to stir up your minds on the 
subject, and to keep your attention fixed there. If a man 
prays for the Spirit, and then diverts his mind to other ob- 
jects ; uses no other means, but goes right away to worldly 
objects ; he tempts God, he swings loose from his object, and 
it would be a miracle if he should get what he prays for. 
How is a sinner to get conviction ? Why, by thinking of his 
sins. That is the way for a Christian to obtain deep feeling, 
by thinking on the object. God is not going to pour these 
things on you without any effort of your own. You must 
cherish the slightest impressions. Take the Bible, and go 
over the passages that show the condition and prospects of 
the world. Look at the world, look at your children, and 
your neighbors, and see their condition while they remain in 
sin, and persevere in, prayer and effort till you obtain the 
blessing of the Spirit of God to dwell in you. This was the 
way, doubtless, that Dr. Watts came to have the feelings which 
he has described in the second Hymn of the second Book, 
which you would do well to read after you go home. . 



My thoughts on awful subjects roll, 

Damnation and the dead : 
What horrors seize the guilty soul 

Upon a dying "bed. 

Lingering about these mortal shores, 

She makes a long delay, 
Till, like a flood, with rapid force 

Death sweeps the wretch away. 

Then, swift and dreadful, she descends 

Down to the fiery coast, 
Amongst abominable fiends, 

Herself a frighted ghost. 



92 SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 

Tliere endless crowds of sinners lie, 

And darkness makes tlieir chains ; 
Tortured with, keen despair they cry, 

Yet wait for fiercer pains. 

Not all their anguish and thtir blood 

For their past guilt atones, 
Nor the compassion of a God 

Shall hearken to their groans. 

Amazing grace, that kept my breath, 

Nor bid my soul remove, 
Till I had learned my Saviour's death, 

And well insured his love. 

Look, as it were, through a telescope that will bring it up 
near to you ; look into hell, and hear them groan ; then turn 
the glass upwards and look at heaven, and see the saints 
there, in their white robes, with their harps in their hands, 
and hear them sing the song of redeeming love ; and ask 
yourself — Is it possible, that L should prevail with God to 
elevate the sinner there ? Do this, and if you are not a wicked 
man, and a stranger to God, you will soon have as much of 
the spirit of prayer as your body can sustain. 

3. You must watch unto prayer. You must keep a look 
out, and see if God grants the blessing when you ask him. 
People sometimes pray, and never look to see if the prayer is 
granted. Be careful also, not to grieve the Spirit of God. 
Confess and forsake your sins. God will never lead you as 
one of his hidden ones, and let you into his secrets, unless 
you confess and forsake your sins. Not be always confessing 
and never forsake, but confess and forsake too. Make re- 
dress wherever you have committed an injury. You cannot 
expect to get the spirit of prayer first, and then repent. You 
cannot fight it through so. Professors of religion, who are 
proud and unyielding, and justify themselves, never will force 
God to dwell with them. 

4. Aim to obey perfectly the written law. In other words, 
have no fellowship with sin. Aim at being entirely above the 
world ; " Be ye perfect even as your Father in heaven is per- 
fect." If .you sin at all, let it be your daily grief. The man 
who does not aim at this, means to live in sin. Such a man 
need not expect God's blessing, for he is not sincere in desir- 
ing to keep all his commandments. 

VIII. For whom does the Spirit intercede ? 

Answer — He maketh intercession for the saints, for all 



SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 93 

saints, for any who are saints. "Likewise the Spirit also 
helpeth our infirmities : for we know not what we should pray 
for as we ought ; but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for 
us with groanings which cannot be uttered. And he that 
searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, 
because he maketh intercession for the saints according to 
the vM of God."— Rom. viii. 26, 27. 

EKilARKS. 

1. Why do you suppose it is, that so little stress is laid on 
the influences of the Spirit in prayer, when so much is said 
about his influences in conversion ? Many people are amaz- 
ingly afraid the Spirit's influences will be left out. They lay 
great stress on the Spirit's influences in converting sinners. 
But how little is said, how little is printed, about his influence 
in prayer ! How little complaining that people do not make 
enough of the Spirit's influences in leading Christians to pray 
according to the will of God ! Let it never be forgotten, that 
no Christian ever prays aright, unless led by the Spirit. He 
has natural power to pray, and so far as the will of God is 
revealed, is able to do it ; but he never does, unless the Spirit 
of God influences him. Just as sinners are able to repent, 
but never do, unless influenced by the Spirit. 

2. This subject lays open the foundation of the difficulty felt 
by many persons on the subject of the Prayer of Faith. They 
object to the idea that faith in prayer is a belief that we shall 
receive the very things for which we ask; and insist that there 
can be no foundation or evidence upon which to rest such a 
belief. In a sermon published a few years since, upon this 
subject, the writer brings forward this difiiculty, and presents 
it in its full strength. I have, says he, no evidence that the 
thing prayed for will be granted, until I have prayed in faith ; 
because, praying in faith is the condition upon which it is pro- 
mised. And of course I cannot claim the promise, until I 
have fulfilled the condition. Now, if the condition is, that I 
am to believe I shall receive the very blessing for which I ask, 
it is evident that the promise is given upon the performance 
of an impossible condition, and is of course a mere nullity. 
The promise would amount to just this: You shall have what- 
soever you ask, upon the condition that you first believe that 
you shall receive it. Now, I must fulfil the condition before 
I can claim the promise. But I can have no evidence that I 
shall receive it until I have believed that I shall receive it. 
This reduces me to the necessity of believing that I shall re- 



94 SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 

ceive it before I have any evidence that I shall receive it — 
which is impossible. 

The whole force of this objection arises out of the fact, that 
the Spirit's influences are entirely overlooked, which he exerts 
in leading an individual to the exercise of faith. It has been 
supposed that the passage in Mark xi. 22 and 24, with other 
kindred promises on the subject of the Prayer of Faith, relate 
exclusively to miracles. But suppose this were true. I would 
ask, What were the apostles to believe, when they prayed for 
a miracle? Were they to believe that the precise miracle 
would be performed for which they prayed ? It is evident that 
they were. In the verses just alluded to, Christ says, " For 
verily I say unto you, that whosoever shall say unto this 
mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea, 
and shall not doubt in his heart, but SHALL BELIEVE 
THAT THESE THINGS WHICH HE SAITH SHALL 
COME TO PASS, he shall have whatsoever he saith. There- 
fore I say unto you, what things soever ye desire, when ye 
pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them." 
Here it is evident, that the thing to be believed, and which 
they were not to doubt in their heart, was, that they should 
have the very blessing for which they prayed. Now the ob- 
jection above stated, lies in all its force against this kind of 
faith, when praying for the performance of a miracle. If it 
be impossible to believe this in praying for any other blessing, 
it was equally so in praying for a miracle. I might ask, Could 
an apostle believe that the miracle would be wrought, before 
he had fulfilled the condition ? inasmuch as the condition was, 
that he should believe that he should receive that for which 
he prayed. Either the promise is a nullity and a deception, 
or there is a possibility of performing the condition. 

Now, as I have said, the whole difficulty lies in the fact that 
the Spirit's influences are entirely overlooked, and that faith 
which is of the operation of God, is left out of the question, If 
the objection is good against praying for any object, it is as 
good against praying in faith for the performance of a miracle. 
The fact is, that the Spirit of God could give evidence, on 
which to believe that any particular miracle would be granted; 
could lead the mind to a firm reliance upon God, and trust 
that the blessing sought would be obtained. And so at the 
present day he can give the same assurance, in praying for 
any blessing that we need. Neither in the one case nor the 
other, are the influences of the Spirit miraculous. Praying is 
the same thing, whether you pray for the conversion of a soul, 
or for a miracle. Faith is the same thing in the one case as 



SPIRIT OF PRAYEB 95 

in the other ; it only terminates on a different object ; in the 
one case on the conversion of a soul, and in the other on the 
performance of a miracle. Nor is faith exercised in the one 
more than in the other, without reference to a promise ; and 
a general promise may with the same propriety be applied to 
the conversion of a soul as to the performance of a miracle. 
And it is equally true in the one case as the other, that no 
man ever prays in faith without being influenced by the Spirit 
of God. And if the Spirit could lead the mind of an apostle 
to exercise faith in regard to a miracle, he can lead the mind 
of another Christian to exercise faith in regard to receiving 
any other blessing, by a reference to the same general 
promise. 

Should any one ask, " When are we under an obligation to 
believe that we shall receive the blessing for which we ask ? " 
I answer : 

(1.) "When there is a particular promise, specifying the par- 
ticular blessing : as where we pray for the Holy Spirit. This 
blessing is particularly named in the promise, and here we 
have evidence, and a-re bound to believe, whether we have any 
Divine influence or not ; just as sinners are bound to repent 
whether the Spirit strives with them or not. Their obligation 
rests, not upon the Spirit's influences, but upon the powers 
of moral agency which they possess ; upon their ability to do 
their duty. And while it is true that not one of them ever 
will repent without the influences of the Spirit, still they have 
power to do so, and are under obligation to do so, whether 
the Spirit strives with them or not. So with the Christian. 
He is bound to believe where he has evidence. And although 
he never does believe, even where he has an express promise, 
without the Spirit of God, yet his obligation to do so rests 
upon his ability, and not upon the Divine influence. 

(2.) Where God makes a revelation by his providence, we 
are bound to believe in proportion to the clearness of the pro- 
vidential indication. 

(3.) So where there is a prophecy, we are bound also to 
believe. But in neither of these cases do toe, in fact, believe, 
without the Spirit of God. 

But where there is neither promise, providence, nor pro- 
phecy, on which to repose our faith, we are under no obliga- 
tion to believe, unless, as I have shown in this discourse, the 
Spirit gives us evidence, by creating desires, and by leading us 
to pray for a particular object. In the case of those promises 
of a general nature, where we are honestly at a loss to know 
in what particular cases to apply them, it may be considered 



96 SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 

rather as our privilege than as our duty, in many instances, 
to apply them to particular cases ; but whenever the Spirit 
of God leads us to apply them to a particular object, then it 
becomes our duty so to apply them. In this case, God ex- 
plains his own promise, and shows how he designed it should 
be applied. And then our obligation to make this application, 
and to believe in reference to this particular object, remains 
in full force. 

3. Some have supposed that Paul prayed in faith for the 
removal of the thorn in the flesh, and that it was not granted. 
But they cannot prove that Paul prayed in faith The pre- 
sumption is all on the other side, as I have shown in a former 
lecture. He had neither promise, nor prophecy, nor provi- 
dence, nor the Spirit of God, to lead him to believe. The 
whole objection goes on the ground that the apostle might 
pray in faith without being led by the Spirit. This is truly a 
shorthand method of disposing of the Spirit's influences in 
prayer. Certainly, to assume that he prayed in faith, is to 
assume either that he prayed in faith without being led by 
the Spirit, or that the Spirit of God led him to pray for that 
which was not according to the will of God. 

I have dwelt the more on this object, because I want to 
have it made so plain, that you will all be careful not to grieve 
the Spirit. I want you to have high ideas of the Holy Ghost, 
and to feel that nothing good will be done without his influ- 
ences. No praying or preaching will be of any avail without 
him. If Jesus Christ were to come down here and preach 
to sinners, not one would be converted without the Spirit. 
Be careful then not to grieve him away, by slighting or 
neglecting his heavenly influences when he invites you to 

4. In praying for aii object, it is necessary to persevere till 
you obtain it. Oh, with what eagerness Christians sometimes 
pursue a sinner in their prayers, when the Spirit of God has 
fixed their desires on him ! No miser pursues his gold with 
so fixed a determination. 

5. The fear of being led by impulses has done great injury, 
by not being duly considered. A person's mind may be led 
by an ignis fcrtuus. But we do wrong if wo let the fear of 
impulses lead us to resist the good impulses of the Holy 
Ghost. No wonder Christians do not have the spirit of 
prayer, if they are unwilling to take the trouble to distinguish ; 
and so reject or resist all impulses and all leadings of 
invisible agents. A great deal has been said about fanati- 
cism, that is very unguarded, and that causes many minds 



SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 97 

to reject the leadings of the Spirit of God. " As many as 
are the sons of God are led by the Spirit of God." And it is 
our duty to try the Spirits whether they be <d God. We 
should insist on a close scrutiny and an accurate discrimina- 
tion. There must be such ajbhing as being led by the Spirit. 
And when we are convinced it is of God, we should be sure to 
follow — follow on, with full confidence that he will not lead us 
wrong. 

6. We see from this subject the absurdity of using forms 
of prayer. The very idea of using a form rejects, of course, 
the leadings of the Spirit. Nothing is more calculated to 
destroy the spirit of prayer, and entirely to darken and con- 
fuse the mind, as to what constitutes prayer, than to use 
forms. Forms of prayer are not only absurd in themselves, 
but they are the very device of the devil to destroy the spirit 
and break the power of prayer. It is of no use to say the 
form is a good one. Prayer does not consist in words. And 
it matters not what the words are, if the heart is not led by 
the Spirit of God. If the desire is not enkindled, the 
thoughts directed, and the whole current of feeling produced 
and led by the Spirit of God, it is not prayer. And set forms 
are, of all things, best calculated to keep an individual from 
praying as he ought. 

7. The subject furnishes a test of character. The Spirit 
maketh intercession — for whom? For the saints. Those 
who are saints are thus exercised. If you are saints, you 
know by experience what it is to be thus exercised, or it is 
because you have grieved the Spirit of God, so that he will 
not lead you. You live in such a manner that this Holy 
Comforter will not dwell with you, nor give you the spirit of 
prayer. If this is so, you must repent. Whether you are a 
Christian or not, do not stop to settle that, but repent, as if 
you never had repented." Do your first works. Don't take 
it for granted that you are a Christian, but go like a humble 
sinner, and pour out your heart unto the Lord. You never 
can have the spirit of prayer in any other way. 

8. The importance of understanding this subject. 

(1.) In order to be usefuL Without this spirit there can 
be no such sympathy between you and God that you can 
either walk with God or work with God. You need to have 
a strong beating of your^heart with his, or you need not ex- 
pect to be greatly useful." 

(2.) As important to your sanctification. Without such 
a spirit you will not be sanctified, you will not understand the 
Bible, you will not know how to apply it to your c^se. I 
5 



08 SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 

want you to feel the importance of having God with you all 
the time. If you live as you ought, he says he will come unto 
you, and make his abode with you, and sup with you, and 
you with him. 

9. If people know not the spirit of prayer, they are very- 
apt to be unbelieving in regard to the results of prayer. 
They do not see what takes place, or do not see the connection, 
or do not see the evidence. They are not expecting spiritual 
blessings. When sinners are convicted, they think they are 
only frightened by such terrible preaching. And when people 
are converted, they feel no confidence, and only say, " We'll 
see how they turn out/' 

10. Those who have the spirit of prayer know when the 
blessing comes. It was just so when Jesus Chrisfc appeared. 
These ungodly doctors did not know him. Why ? Because 
they were not praying for the redemption of Israel. But 
Simeon and Anna knew him. How was that ? Mark what they 
saic^ how they prayed and how they lived. They were pray- 
ing in faith, and so they were not surprised when he came. 
So it is with such Christians. If sinners are convicted or 
converted, they are not surprised at it. They were expecting 
just such things. They know God when he comes, because 
they were looking out for his visits. 

11. There are three classes of persons in the church who 
are liable to error, or have left the truth out of view, on this 
subject. 

(1.) Those who place great reliance on prayer, and use no 
other means. They are alarmed at any special means, and 
talk about your " getting up a revival. " 

(2.) Over against these are those who use means, and pray, 
but never think about the influences of the Spirit in prayer, 
They talk about prayer for the Spirit, and feel the import- 
ance of the Spirit in the conversion of sinners, but do not 
realize the importance of the Spirit in prayer. And their 
prayers are all cold talk, nothing that any body can feel, or 
that can take hold of God. 

(3.) Those who have certain strange notions about the 
sovereignty of God, and are waiting for God to convert the 
world without prayer or means. 

There must be in the church a deeper sense of the need of 
the spirit of prayer. The fact is that, generally,, those who 
use means most assiduously, and make the most strenuous 
efforts for the salvation of men, and who have the most cor- 
rect notions of the manner in which means should be used 
for converting sinners, also pray most for the Spirit of God, 



SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 09 

and wrestle most with God for his blessing. And what is the 
result ? Let facts speak, and say whether these persons do 
or do not pray, and whether the Spirit of God does not tes- 
tify to their prayers, and follow thqjr labors with his power. 

12. A spirit very different from the spirit of prayer appears 
to prevail in certain portions of the Presbyterian church at 
the present time. Nothing will produce an excitement and 
opposition so quick as the spirit of prayer. If any person 
should feel burdened with the case of sinners, in prayer, so 
as to groan in his prayer, why, the women are nervous, and 
he is visited at once with rebuke and opposition. From my 
soul I abhor all affectation of feeling where there is none, 
and all attempts to work Okie's self up into feeling by groans. 
But I feel bound to defend the position that there is such a 
thing as being in a state of mind in which there is but one 
way to keep from groaning ; and that is, by resisting the 
Holy Ghost. I was once present where this subject was dis- 
cussed. It was said that groaning ought to be discounte- 
nanced. The question was asked, whether God could not 
produce such a state of feeling that to abstain from groaning 
was impossible? and the answer was, "Yes, but he never 
does." Then the apostle Paul was egregiously deceived when 
he wrote about groanings that cannot be uttered. Edwards 
was deceived when he wrote his book upon revivals. Re- 
vivals are all in the dark. Now, no man who reviews the 
history of the church will adopt such a sentiment. I do not 
like this attempt to shut out, or stifle, or keep down, or limit 
the spirit of prayer. I would sooner cut off my right hand 
than rebuke the spirit of prayer, as I have heard of its being 
done by saying, "Don't let me hear any more groaning." 

But then, I hardly know where to conclude this subject. I 
should like to discuss it a month, and till the whole church 
could understand it, so as to pray the prayer of faith. Be- 
loved, I want to ask you if you believe all this ? Or do you 
wonder that I should talk so ? Perhaps some of you have 
had some glimpses of these things. Now, will you give your- 
selves up to prayer, and live so as to have the spirit of 
prayer, and have the spirit with you all the time ? Oh, for a 
praying church ! I once knew a minister who had a revival four- 
teen winters in succession. I did not know how to account for it 
till I saw one of his members get up in a prayer meeting and 
make a confession. " Brethren," said he, " I have been long 
in the habit of praying every Saturday night till after mid- 
night, for the descent of the Holy Ghost among us. And 
now, brethren," and he began to weep, "I confess that I 



100 SPIRIT OF PRAYER. 

have neglected it for two or three weeks." The secret was 
out. That minister had a praying church. Brethren, in my 
present state of health, I find it impossible to pray as much 
as I have been in the hal^t of doing, and continue to preach. 
It overcomes my strength. Now, shall I give myself up to 
prayer, and stop preaching? That will not do. Now, will 
not you, who are in health, throw yourselves into this work, 
and bear this burden, and lay yourselves out in prayer, till 
God will pour out his blessing upon us ? 



LECTURE VH. 



BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 
Text.— Be filled with the Spirit.— Eph. y. 18. 

Several of my last lectures have been on the subject of ' 
prayer, and the importance of haying the spirit of prayer, of 
the intercession of the Holy Ghost. Whenever the necessity 
and importance of the Spirit's influences are held for^h, there 
can be no doubt that persons are in danger of abusing the 
doctrine, and perverting it to their own injury. For instance, 
when you tell sinners that without the Holy Spirit they never 
will repent, they are very liable to pervert the truth, and un- 
derstand by it that they cannot repent, and therefore are under 
no obligation to do it until they feel the Spirit, It is often 
difficult to make them see that all the " cannot " consists in 
their unwillingness, and not in their inability. So again, 
when we tell Christians that they need the Spirit's aid in pray- 
er, they are very apt to think they are under no obligation to 
pray the prayer of faith, until they feel the influences of 
the Spirit. They overlook then obligation to be filled with 
the Spirit and wait for the spirit of prayer to come upon them 
without asking, and thus tempt God. 

Before we come to consider the other department of means 
for promoting a revival, that is, the means to be used icith sin- 
ne)*s } I wish to show you, that if you five without the Spirit, 
you are without excuse. Obligation to perform duty never 
rests on the condition, that we shall first have the influence 
of the Spirit, but on the powers of moral agency. We, as 
moral agents, have the power to obey God, and are perfectly 
bound to obey, and the reason we do not is, that we are un- 
willing. The influences of the Spirit are wholly a matter of 
grace. If they were indispensable to enable us to perform 
duty, the bestowment of them would not be a gracious act, 
but a mere matter of common justice. Sinners are not bound 
to repent because they have the Spirits influence, or because 
they can obtain it, but because they are moral agents, and 
have the powers which God requires them to exercise. So in 
the case of Christians. They are not bound to pray in faith 
because they have the Spirit, (except in those cases where his 

(101; 



102 BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 

influences in begetting desire constitute the evidence that it 
is God's will to grant the object of desire,) but because they 
have evidence. They are not bound to pray in faith at all, 
except when they have evidence as the foundation of their 
faith. They must have evidence from promises, or principle, 
or prophecy, or providence. And where they have evidence 
independent of his influences, they are bound to exercise faith, 
whether they have the Spirit's influence or not. They are 
bound to see the evidence, and to believe. The Spirit is given 
not to enable them to see or believe, but because without it 
they will not look, nor feel, nor act, as they ought. I purpose 
this evening to show from the text, 

I. That Christians may be filled with the Spirit of God. 

II. That it is their duty to be filled with the Spirit. 
HI. Why they are not filled with the Spirit. 

IV. The guilt of those who have not the Spirit of God, to 
lead their minds in duty and prayer. 

V. The consequences that will follow if they are filled with 
the Spirit. 

VI. The consequences if they are not. 

I. I am to show you that you may have the Spirit. Not 
because it is a matter of justice for God to give you his Spir- 
it, but because he has promised to give it to those that ask. 
" If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your 
children, hoiv much more shall your Father which is in heaven 
give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him ? " If you ask the 
Holy Spirit, God has promised to give it. 

But again, God has commanded you to have it. He says 
in the text, " Be filled with the Spirit." When God com- 
mands us to do a thing, it is the highest possible evidence 
that we can do it. For God to command, is equivalent to 
an oath that we can do it. He has no right to command, 
unless we have power to obey. There is no stopping short 
of the conclusion that God is an infinite tyrant, if he com- 
mands that which is impracticable. 

II. I am to show, secondly, that it is your duty. 

1. Because you have a promise of it. 

2. Because God has commanded it. 

3. It is essential to your own growth in grace that you 
should be filled with the Spirit. 

4. It is as important as it is that you should be sanctified. 

5. It is as necessary as it is that you should be useful and 
do good in the world. 

6. If you do not have the Spirit of God in you, you will 
dishonor God, disgrace the church, and die and go to hell. 



BE FILLED WITH THE SPIKIT. 103 

III. Wiry many do not have the Spirit. There are some, 
even professors of religion, who will say, " I do not know any 
thing about this ; I never had any such experience ; either 
it is not true or I am all wrong." No doubt you are all wrong, 
if you know nothing about the influence of the Spirit. I want 
to present you with a few of the reasons that may prevent 
you from being filled with the Spirit. 

1. It may be that you live a hypocritical life. Your pray- 
ers are not earnest and sincere. Not only is your religion a 
mere outside show, without any heart, but you are insincere 
in your intercourse with others. Thus you do many things 
to grieve the Spirit, so that he cannot dwell with you. 

A minister was once boarding in a certain family, and the 
lady of the house was constantly complaining that she did 
not enjoy her mind, and nothing seemed to help her. One 
day some ladies called to see her, and she protested that she 
was very much offended because they had not called before, 
and pressed them to stay and spend the day, and declared 
she could not consent to let them go. They excused them- 
selves, however, and left the house, and as soon as they were 
gone, she said to her servant, she wondered these people had 
so little sense as to be always troubling her, and taking up 
her time. The minister heard it, and immediately rebuked 
her, and told her she could now see why she did not enjoy 
religion. It was because she was in the daily habit of insin- 
cerity that amounted to downright lying. And the Spirit of 
truth could not dwell in such a heart. 

2. Others have so much levity that the Spirit will not dwell 
with them. The Spirit of God is solemn, and serious, and 
will not dwell with those who give way to thoughtless levity. 

3. Others are so proud that they cannot have the Spirit. 
They are so fond of dress, high life, equipage, fashion, etc., 
that it is no wonder they are not filled with the Spirit. And 
yet such persons will pretend to be at a loss to know why it 
is that they do not enjoy religion ! 

4. Some are so worldly-minded, love property so well, and 
are trying so hard to get rich, that they cannot have the Spir- 
it. How can he dwell with them, when their thoughts are all 
on things of the world, and all their powers absorbed in pro- 
curing wealth ? And they hold on to it when they get it, and 
they are pained if pressed by conscience to do something for 
the conversion of the world. They show how much they 
love the world, in all their intercourse with others. Little 
things .show it. They will screw down a poor man, who is 
doing a little piece of work for them, to the lowest penny. If 



104 BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 

they are dealing on a large scale, very likely they will be lib- 
eral and fair, because it is for their advantage. But if it is a 
person they care not about, a laborer, or a mechanic, or a 
servant, they will grind him down to the last fraction, no 
matter what it is really worth ; and they actually pretend to 
make conscience of it, that they cannot possibly give any 
more. Now they would be ashamed to deal so with people 
of their own rank, because it would be known and injure 
their reputation. But God knows it, and has it all written 
down, that they are covetous and unfair in their dealings, 
and will not do right, only when it is for their interest. Now 
how can such professors have the Spirit of God ? It is im- 
possible. 

There are a multitude of such things, by which the Spirit 
of God is grieved. People call them little sins, but God will 
not call them little. I was struck with this thought, when I 
saw a little notice in the Evangelist. The publishers stated 
that they had many thousand dollars in the hands of subscrib- 
ers, which was justly due, and that it would cost them as 
much as it was worth to send an agent to collect it. I sup- 
pose it is so with all the other religious papers, that subscrib- 
ers either put the publisher to the trouble and expense of 
sending an agent to collect his due, or else they cheat him out 
of it. There are doubtless, I do not know how many, thous- 
ands of dollars held back in this way by professors of religion, 
just because it is in such small sums, or they are so far off 
that they cannot be sued. And yet these people will pray, 
and appear very pious, and wonder why they cannot enjoy 
religion, and have the Spirit of God ! It is this looseness of 
moral principle, this want of conscience about little matters, 
prevailing in the church, that grieves away the Holy Ghost. 
Why, it would be disgraceful to God to dwell and have com- 
munion with such persons, who will take an advantage and 
cheat their neighbor out of his dues, because they can do it 
and not be disgraced. 

5. Others do not fully confess and forsake their sins, and so 
cannot enjoy the Spirit's presence. They will confess their 
-sins in general terms, perhaps, and are ready always to ac- 
knowledge that they are sinners. Or they will confess par- 
tially some particular sins. But they do it reservedly, proud- 
ly, guardedly, as if they were afraid they should say a little 
more than is necessary ; that is, when they confess to men 
the injuries done to them. They do it in a way which shows 
that, instead of bursting forth from an ingenuous heart, the 
confession is wrung from them, by the hand of conscience 



BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 105 

gripping them. If they have injured any one, they will make 
a partial recantation, which is hard-hearted^cruel, and hypo- 
critical, and then they will ask, " Now, brother, are you satis- 
fied ? " And you know it would be very difficult for a person 
to say that he was not satisfied, even if the confession is cold 
and heartless. But I tell you God is not satisfied. He knows 
whether you have gone the full length of honest confession, 
and taken all the blame that belongs to you. If your con- 
fessions have been constrained and wrung from you, do you 
suppose you can cheat God ? " He that covereth his sins 
shall not prosper, but whoso confesseth and forsaketh shall 
find mercy." " He that humble th himself shall be exalted." 
Unless you come quite down, and confess your sins honestly, 
and remunerate where you have done injury, you have no 
right to expect the spirit of prayer. 

6. Others are neglecting some known duty, and that is the 
reason why they have not the Spirit. One does not pray in 
his family, though he knows he ought to do it, and yet he is 
trying to get the spirit of prayer ! There is many a young man 
who feels in his heart that he ought to prepare for the ministry, 
and he has not the spirit of prayer because he has some 
worldly object in view, which prevents his devoting himself to 
the work. He has known his duty, and refuses to do it, and 
now he is praying for direction from the Spirit of God. He 
cannot have it. One has neglected to make a profession of 
religion. He knows hi£ duty, but he refuses to join the church. 
He once had the spirit of prayer, but neglecting his duty, he 
grieved the Spirit away. And now he thinks, if he could once 
more enjoy the fight of God's countenance, and have his evi- 
dences renewed, he would do his duty, and join the chmxh. 
And so he is praying for it again, and trying to bring God 
over to his terms, to grant him his presence. You need not 
expect it. You will five and die in darkness, unless you are 
willing first to do your duty, before God manifests himself as 
reconciled to you. It is in vain to say, you will come forward 
if God will first show you the light of his countenance. He 
never will do it as long as you live ; he will let you die with- 
out it, if you refuse to do your duty. 

I have known women who felt that they ought to talk to 
their unconverted husbands, and pray with them, but they 
have neglected it, and so they get into the dark. They knew 
their duty and refused to do it; they went round it, and there 
they lost the spirit of prayer. 

If you have neglected any known duty, and thus lost the 
spirit of prayer, you must yield first. God has a controversy 
5* 



106 BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 

with yon ; yon have refused obedience to God, and yon mnst 
retract it. Yon «iay have forgotten it, bnt God has not, and 
yon mnst set yonrself to recall it to mind, and repent. God 
never will yield nor grant yon his Spirit, till yon repent. Had 
I an omniscient eye now, I conld call the names of the indi- 
vidnals in this congregation, who had neglected some known 
dnty, or committed some sin, that they have not repented of, 
and now they are praying for the spirit of prayer, bnt they 
cannot succeed in obtaining it. 

To illustrate this I will relate a case. A good man in the 
western part of this State, had been a long time an engaged 
Christian, and he used to talk to the sleepy church with which 
he was connected. By-and-by the church was offended and 
got out of patience, and many told him they wished he would 
let them alone, they did not think he could do them any good. 
He took them at their word, and they all went to sleep to- 
gether, and remained so two or three years. By-and-by a 
minister came among them and a revival commenced, but this 
elder seemed to have lost his spirituality. He used to be for- 
ward in a good work, but now he held back. Everybody 
thought it unaccountable. Finally, as he was going home one 
night, the truth of his situation flashed upon his mind, and he 
went into absolute despair for a few minutes. At length his 
thoughts were directed back to that sinful resolution to let the 
church alone in their sins. He felt that no language could 
describe the blackness of that sin. He realized that moment 
what it was to be lost, and to find that God had a controversy 
with him. He saw that it was a bad spirit which caused the 
resolution: the same that caused Moses to say, " You rebels." 
He*hirmbled himself on the spot, and God poured out his 
Spirit on him. Perhaps some of you that hear me are in just 
this situation. You have said something provoking or un- 
kind to some person. Perhaps it was peevishness to a servant 
that was a Christian. Or perhaps it was speaking censorious- 
ly of a minister or some other person. Perhaps you have 
been angry because your opinions have not been taken, or 
your dignity has been encroached upon. Search thoroughly, 
and see if you cannot find out the sin. Perhaps you have 
forgotten it. But God has not forgotten it, and never will 
forgive your unchristian conduct until you repent. God can- 
not overlook it. It would do no good if he should. What 
good would it do to forgive, while the sin is rankling in your 
heart? 

7. Perhaps you have resisted the Spirit of God. Perhaps 
you are in the habit of resisting the Spirit. You resist convie- 



BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 107 

tion. In preaching, when something has been said that 
reached your case, your heart has risen up against it and re- 
sisted. Many are willing to hear plain and searching preach- 
ing so long as they can apply it all to others; a misanthropic 
spirit makes them take a satisfaction in hearing others searched 
and rebuked ; but if the truth touch them, they directly cry 
out that it is personal and abusive. Is this your case ? 

8. The fact is that you do not on tJie whole desire the Spirit. 
This is true in every case in which you do not have the Spirit. 
Let me not be mistaken here. I want you should carefully 
discriminate. Nothing is more common than for people to 
desire a thing on some accounts, which they do not choose on 
the whole. A person may see an article in a store which he 
desires to purchase, and he goes in and asks the price, and 
thinks of it a little, and on the whole concludes not to pur- 
chase it. He desires the article, but does not like the price, 
or does not like to be at the expense, so that, upon the whole, 
he prefers not to purchase it. That is the reason why he does 
not purchase it. So persons may desire the Spirit of God on 
some accounts ; from a regard to the comfort and joy of heart 
which it brings. If you know what it is by former experience 
to commune with God, and how sweet it is to dissolve in peni- 
tence and to be filled with the Spirit, you cannot but desire a 
return of those joys. And you may set yourself to pray 
earnestly for it, and to pray for a revival of religion. But on 
the whole you are unwilling it should come. You have so 
much to do that you cannot attend to it. Or it will require 
so many sacrifices, that you cannot bear to have it. There 
are some things you are not willing to give up. You find that 
if you wish to have the Spirit of God dwell with you, you must 
lead a different life, you must give up the world, you must 
make sacrifices, you must break off from your worldly associ- 
ates, and make confession of your sins. And so on the whole 
you do not choose to have him come, unless he will consent 
to dwell with you and let you live as you please. But that he 
never will do. 

9. Perhaps you do not pray for the Spirit ; or you pray and 
use no other means, or pray and do not act consistently with 
your prayers. Or you use means calculated to resist them. 
Or you ask, and as soon as he comes and begins to affect 
your mind, you grieve him right away, and will not walk 
with him. 

TV. I am to show the great guilt of not having the Spirit 
of God. 

1. Your guilt is just as great as the authority of God is 



108 BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 

great, which commands you to be filled with the Spirit. God 
commands it, and it is just as much a disobedience of God's 
commands, as it is to swear profanely, or steal, or commit 
adultery, or break the Sabbath. Think of that. And yet there 
are many people who do not blame themselves at all for not 
having the Spirit. They even think themselves quite pious 
Christians, because they go to prayer meetings, and partake 
of the sacrament, and all that, though they live year after year 
without the Spirit of God. Now, you see that the same God 
who says, " Do not get drunk," says also, " Be filled with the 
Spirit." You all say, if a man is an habitual murderer, or a 
thief, he is no Christian. Why ? Because he lives in habitual 
disobedience of God. So if he swears, you have no charity 
for him. You will not allow him to plead that his heart is 
right, and words are nothing. God does not care anything 
about words. You would think it outrageous to have such a 
man in church, or to have a company of snch people pretend 
to call themselves a church of Christ. And yet they are not 
a whit more absolutely living in disobedience to God than you 
are, who live without the spirit of prayer, and without the pre- 
sence of God. 

2. Your guilt is equal to all the good you might do if you 
had the Spirit of God in as great a measure as it is your duty 
to have it, and as you might have it. You, elders of this 
church 1 how much good you might do, if you had the Spirit. 
And you, Sunday-school teachers, how much good you might 
do ; and you, church-members, too, if you were filled with the 
Spirit, you might do vast good, infinite good. Well, your 
guilt is just as great. Here is a blessing promised, and 
you can have it by doing your duty. You are entirely re- 
sponsible to the church and to God for all this good that 
you might do. A man is responsible for all the good he 
can do. 

3. Your guilt is further measured by all the evil which you 
do in consequence of not having the Spirit. You are a dis- 
honor to religion. You are a stumbling block to the church, 
and to the world. And your guilt is enhanced by all the va- 
rious influences you exert. And it will prove so in the day of 
judgment. 

V. The consequences of having the Spirit. 

1. You will be called eccentric ; and probably you will de- 
serve it. Probably you will really be eccentric. I never knew 
a person who was filled with the Spirit, that was not called ec- 
centric. And the reason is, that they are unlike other people. 
This is always a term of comparison. There is therefore the 



BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 109 

best of reasons why such persons should appear eccentric. 
They act under different influences, take different views, are 
'moved by different motives, led by a different spirit. You are 
to expect such remarks. How often I have heard the remark 
respecting such and such persons, " He is a very good man — 
but he is rather eccentric.' 5 I have sometimes asked for the 
particulars ; in what does his eccentricity consist ? I hear 
the catalogue, and the amount is, that he is spiritual Make 
up your mind for this, to be eccentric. There is such a thing 
as affected eccentricity. Horrible ! But there is such a thing 
as being so deeply imbued with the Spirit of God, that you 
must and will act so as to appear strange and eccentric, to 
those who cannot understand the reasons of your con- 
duct. 

2. If you have much of the spirit of God, it is not unlikely 
you will be thought deranged, by many, We judge men to 
be deranged when they act differently from what we think to 
be prudent and according to common sense, and when they 
come to conclusions for which we can see no good reasons. 
Paul was accused of being deranged by those who did not 
understand the views of things under which he acted. No 
doubt Festus thought the man was crazy, and that much 
learning had made him mad. But Paul said, " I am not mad, 
most noble Festus." His conduct was so strange, so novel, 
that Festus thought it must be insanity. But the truth was, 
he only saw the subject so clearly that he threw his whole 
soul into it. They were entirely in the dark in respect to the 
motive by which he was actuated. This is by no means un- 
common. Multitudes have appeared to those who had no 
spirituality as if they were deranged. Yet they .saw good 
reasons for doing as they did. God was leading their minds 
to act in such a way that those who were not spiritual could 
not see the reasons. You must make up your mind to this, 
and so much the more, as you live more above the world and 
walk with God. 

3. If you have the Spirit of God, you must expect to feel 
great distress in view of the church and the world. Some 
spiritual epicures ask for the Spirit because they think it will 
make them so perfectly happy. Some people think that 
spiritual Christians are always very happy and free from 
sorrow. 

There never was a greater mistake. Read your Bibles, and 
see how the prophets and apostles were always groaning and 
distressed in view of the state of the church and the world. 
The apostle Paul says he was always bearing about in his 



110 BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 

body the dying of the Lord Jesus. I protest, says he, that I 
die daily. You will know what it is to sympathize with the 
Lord Jesus Christ, and be baptized with the baptism that he 
was baptized with. Oh how he agonized in view of the state 
of sinners ! how he travailed in soul for their salvation ! The 
more you have of his Spirit, the more clearly you will see the 
state of sinners, and the more deeply you will be distressed 
about them. Many times you will feel as if you could not 
live in view of their situation ; your distress will be unutter- 
able. Paul says, Eom. ix : 1-3 : " I say the truth in Christ, 
I He not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy 
Ghost, that I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in 
my heart. For I could *wish that myself were accursed 
from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the 
flesh." 

4. You will be often grieved with the state of the ministry. 
Some years since I met a woman belonging to one of the 
churches in this city. I inquired of her the state of religion 
here. She seemed unwilling to say much about it, made some 
general remarks, and then choked, and her eyes filled, and 
she said, " Oh, our minister's mind seems to be very dark.' 
Spiritual Christians often feel like this, and often weep over 
it. I have seen much of it, and often found Christians who 
wept and groaned in secret, to see the darkness on the minds 
of ministers in regard to religion, their earthliness and fear 
of man ; but they dared not speak of it, lest they should be 
denounced and threatened, and perhaps turned out of the 
church. I do not say these things censoriously, to reproach 
my brethren, but because they are true. And ministers 
ought to know that nothing is more common than for spirit- 
ual Christians to feel burdened and distressed at the state of 
the ministry. I would not wake up any wrong feelings 
towards ministers, but it is time it should be known that 
Christians do often get spiritual views of things, and their 
souls are kindled up, and then they find that their minister 
does not enter into their feelings, that he is far below the 
standard of what he ought to be, and in spirituality far be- 
low some of the members of his church. This is one of the 
most prominent and deeply to be deplored evils of the 
present day. The piety of the ministry, though red, is so 
superficial, in many instances, that the spiritual part of the 
church feel that ministers cannot, do not, sympathize with 
them. Their preaching does not meet their wants, it does 
not feed them, it does not meet their experience. The min- 
isters have not depth enough of religious experience to know 



BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. Ill 

liow to search and wake up the church ; to help those under 
temptation, to support the weak, to direct the strong, and 
lead them through all the labyrinths and mazes with which 
their path may be beset. "When a minister has gone with a 
church, as far as his experience in spiritual exercise goes, there 
he stops ; and until he has a renewed experience, until he is 
reconverted, his heart broken up afresh, and he set forward 
in the divine life and Christian experience, he will help them 
no more. He may preach sound doctrine, and so may an un- 
converted minister ; but, after all, his preaching will want 
that searching pungency, that practical bearing, that unction 
which alone will reach the case of a spiritually-minded 
Christian. It is a fact over which the church is groaning, 
that the piety of young men suffers so much in the course of 
their education, that when they enter the ministry, however 
much intellectual furniture they may possess, they are in a 
state of spiritual babyhood. They want nursing, and need 
rather to be fed, than to undertake to feed the Church of 
God. 

5. If you have much of the Spirit of God, you must make 
up your mind to have much opposition, both in the church 
and the world. Very likely the leading men in the church 
will oppose you. There has always been opposition in the 
church. So it was when Christ was on earth. If you are far 
above their state of feeling, church members will oppose you. 
If any man will live godly in Christ Jesus, he must expect 
persecution. Often the elders, and even the minister, will 
oppose you, if you are filled with the Spirit of God. 

6. You must expect very frequent and agonizing conflicts 
with Satan. Satan has very little trouble with those Chris- 
tians who are not spiritual, but lukewarm,* and slothful, and 
worldly-minded. And such do not understand what is said 
about spiritual conflicts. Perhaps they will smile when such 
things are mentioned. And. so the devil lets them alone. 
They don't disturb him, nor he them. But spiritual Chris- 
tians, he understands very well, are doing him a vast injury, 
and, therefore, he sets himself against them. Such Christians 
often have terrible conflicts. They have temptations that 
they never thought, of before, blasphemous thoughts, atheism, 
suggestions to do deeds of wickedness, to destroy their own 
lives, and the like. And if you are spiritual, you may expect 
these terrible conflicts. 

7. You will have greater conflicts with yourself than you 
ever thought of. You will sometimes find your own corrup- 
tions making strange headway against the Spirit. " The flesh 



112 BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 

lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh/' 
Such a Christian is often thrown into consternation at the 
power of his own corruptions. One of the Commodores in the 
United States was, as I have been told, a spiritual man ; and 
his pastor told me he had known that man lie on the floor and 
groan a great part of the night, in conflict with his own 
corruptions, and to cry to God in agony that he would 
break the power of the temptation. It seemed as if the devil 
was determined to ruin him ; and his own feelings, for the 
time being, were almost in league with the devil 

8. But you will have peace with God. If the church, and 
sinners, and the devil oppose you, there will be one with 
whom you will have peace. Let those who are called to these 
trials, and conflicts, and temptations, and who groan, and 
pray, and weep, and break your hearts, remember this con- 
sideration : your peace, so far as your feelings towards God 
are concerned, will flow like a river. 

9. You will likewise have peace of conscience, if you are 
led by the Spirit. You will not be constantly goaded and 
kept on the rack hy a guilty conscience. Your conscience 
will be calm and quiet, unruffled as the summer's lake. 

10. If filled with the Spirit, you will be useful *You cannot 
help being useful. Even if you were sick and unable to go 
out of your room, or to converse, and saw nobody, you would 
be ten times more useful than a hundred of those common 
sort of Christians who have no spirituality. To give you an 
idea of this, I will relate an anecdote. A pious man in the 
Western part of this State was sick with a consumption. He 
was a poor man, and sick for years. An unconverted mer- 
chant in the place had a kind heart, and used to send him 
now and then something for his comfort, or for his family. 
He felt grateful for the kindness, but could make no return, 
as he wanted to do. At length he determined that the best 
return he could make would be to pray for his salvation ; he 
began to pray, and his soul kindled, and he got hold of God. 
There was no revival there, but by and by, to the astonish- 
ment of every body, this merchant came right out on the 
Lord's side. The fire kindled all over the place, and a pow- 
erful revival followed, and multitudes were converted. 

This poor man lingered in this way for several years, and 
died. After his death, I visited the place, and his widow 
put into my hands his diary. Among other things, he says 
in his diary : " I am acquainted with about thirty ministers 
and churches." He then goes on to set apart certain hours 
-in the day and week to pray for each of these ministers 



BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 113 

and churches, and also certain seasons for praying for 
the different missionary stations. Then followed, under 
different dates, such facts as these : "To-day," naming the 
date, "I have been enabled to offer what I call the prayer of 

faith for the outpouring of the Spirit on church, and 

I trust in God there will soon be a revival there. " Under 
another date, " I have to-day been able to offer what I call 
the prayer of faith for such a church, and trust there will 
soon be a revival there." Thus he had gone over a great num- 
ber of churches, recording the fact that he had prayed for 
them in faith that a revival might soon prevail among them. 
Of the missionary stations, if I recollect right, he mentions 
in particular the mission at Ceylon. I believe the last place 
mentioned in his diary, for which he offered the prayer of 
faith, was the place in which he lived. Not long after noting 
these facts in his diary, the revival commenced, and went over 
the region of country, nearly, I believe, if not quite, in the 
order in which they had been mentioned in his diary ; and in 
due time news came from Ceylon that there was a revival of 
religion there. The revival in his own town did not com- 
mence till after his death. Its commencement was at the 
time when his widow put into my hands the document to 
which I have referred. She told me that he was so exercised 
in prayer during his sickness that she often feared he would 
pray himself to death. The revival was exceedingly great 
and powerful in all the region ; and the fact that it was about 
to prevail had not been hidden from this servant of the Lord 
According to his word, the secret of the Lord is with them 
that fear him. Thus this man, too feeble in his body to go 
out of his house, was yet more useful to the world and the 
church of God than all the heartless professors of the coun- 
try. Standing between God and the desolations of Zion, 
and pouting out his heart in believing prayer, as a prince he 
had power with God, and prevailed. 

11. If you are filled with the Spirit, you will not find your- 
selves distressed, and galled, and worried, when people speak 
against you. When I find people irritated and fretting at any 
little thing that touches them, I am sure they have not the 
Spirit of Christ. Jesus Christ could have everything said 
against him that malice could invent, and yet not be in the 
least disturbed by it. If you mean to be meek under perse- 
cution, and exemplify the temper of the Saviour, and honor 
religion in this way, you need to be filled with the Spirit. 

12. You will be wise in using means for the conversion of 
sinners. If the Spirit of God is in you, he will lead you to 



114 BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 

use means wisely, in a way adapted to the end, and to avoid 
doing hurt. No man who is not filled with the Spirit of God, 
is fit to be employed in directing the measures adopted in a 
revival. Their hands will be all thumbs, unable to take hold, 
and they will act as if they had not common sense. But a 
man who is led by the Spirit of God, will know to time his 
measures right, and how to apportion Divine truth, so as to 
make it tell to the best advantage. 

13. You will be calm under affliction ; not thrown into con- 
fusion or consternation when you see the storm coming over 
you. People around will be astonished at your calmness and 
cheerfulness under heavy trials, not knowing the inward sup- 
ports of those who are filled with the Spirit. 

14. You will be resigned in death ; you will always feel 
prepared to die, and not afraid to die, and after death you will 
be proportionally more happy for ever in heaven. 

VI. Consequences of not being filled with the Spirit. 

1. You will often doubt, and reasonably doubt, whether you 
are Christians. You will have doubts, and you ought to have 
them. The sons of God are led by the Spirit of God. And 
if you are not led by the Spirit what reason have you to think 
you are sons ? You will try to make a little evidence go a 
great way to bolster up your hopes, but you cannot do it, un- 
less your conscience is seared as with a hot iron. You cannot 
help being plunged often into painful doubt and uncertainty 
about your state. Eom. viii. 9. — " But ye are not in the flesh, 
but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. 
Now, if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of 
his." 2. Cor. xiii. 5. — "Examine yourselves whether ye be in 
the faith ; prove your own selves : know ye not your own 
selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be repro- 
bates?" 

2. You will always be unsettled in your views about the 
prayer of faith. The prayer of faith is something so spiritual, 
so much a matter of experience and not of speculation, that 
unless you are spiritual yourselves, you will not understand it 
fully. You may talk a great deal about the prayer of faith, 
and for the time get thoroughly convinced of it. But you 
will never feel so settled on it as to retain the same position 
of mind concerning it, and in a little while you will be all un- 
certainty. I knew a curious instance in a brother minister. 
He told me, "When I have the Spirit of God, and enjoy his 
presence, I believe firmly in the prayer of faith ; but when I 
have it not, I find myself doubting whether there is any such 
thing, and my mind is full of objections." I know, from my 



BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 115 

own experience, what this is, and when I hear persons raising 
objections to that view of prayer which I have presented in 
these lectures, I understand very well what their difficulty is, 
and have often found it impossible to satisfy their minds, 
while so far from God ; when at the same time they would 
understand it themselves, without argument, whenever they 
had experienced it. 

3. If you have not the Spirit, you will be very apt to stum- 
ble at those who have. You will doubt the propriety of then* 
conduct. If they seem to feel a good deal more than your- 
self, you will be likely to call it animal feeling. You will 
perhaps doubt then* sincerity when they say they have 
such feelings. You will say, "I do not know what to make 
of brother such-a-one ; he seems to be very pious, but I do 
not understand him, I think he has a great deal of animal 
feeling." Thus you will be trying to censure them, for the 
purpose of justifying yourself. 

4. You will be had in reputation with the impenitent, and 
with carnal professors. They will praise you, as a rational, 
orthodox, consistent Christian. You will be just in the frame 
of mind to walk with them, because you are agreed. 

5. You will be much troubled with fears about fanaticism. 
Whenever there are revivals, you will see in them a strong 
tendency to fanaticism, and will be full of fears and anxiety, 
or rather of opposition to them. 

6. You will be much disturbed by the measures that are 
used in revivals. If any measures are adopted, that are de- 
cided and direct, you will think they are all " new," and will 
be stumbled at them just in proportion to your want of spir- 
ituality. You do not see then* appropriateness. You will 
stand and cavil at the measures, because you are so blind that 
you cannot see then* adaptedness, while all heaven is rejoic- 
ing in them as the means of saving souls. 

7. You will be a reproach to religion. The impenitent 
will sometimes praise vou because vou are so much like them- 
selves, and sometimes laugh about you because you are such 
a hypocrite. 

8. You will know but little about the Bible. 

9. If you die without the Spirit, you will fall into hell. 
There can be no doubt of this. Without the Spirit you will 
never be prepared for heaven. 

^ EEilARKS. 

1. Christians are as guilty for not having the Spirit,, as sin- 
ners are for not repenting. 



116 BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 

2. They are even more so. As they have more light, they 
are so much the more guilty. 

3. All beings have a right to complain of Christians who 
are not filled with the Spirit. You are not doing work for 
God, and he has a right to complain. He has placed his 
Spirit at your disposal, and if you have it not, he has a right 
to look to you and to hold you responsible for all the good 
you might do, did you possess it. You are sinning against all 
heaven, for you ought to be adding to their happy ranks. 
Sinners, the church, ministers, have a right to complain. 

4. You are right in the way of the work of the Lord. It 
is in vain for a minister to try to work over your head. Min- 
isters often groan and struggle, and wear themselves out in 
vain, trying to do good where there is a church who live so 
that they do not have the Spirit of God. If the Spirit is 
poured out at any time, the church will grieve him right 
away. Thus you may tie the hands and break the heart of 
your minister, and break him down, and perhaps kill him, 
because you will not be filled with the Spirit. 

5. You see the reason why Christians need the Spirit, and 
the degree of their dependence. This cannot be too strongly 
exhibited. 

6. Do not tempt God, by waiting for his Spirit, while using 
no means to procure his presence. 

7. If you mean to have the Spirit, you must be childlike, 
and yield to his influences — just as yielding as air. If he is 
drawing you to prayer, you must quit everything to yield to 
his gentle strivings. No doubt you have sometimes felt a 
desire to pray for some object, and you have put it off and 
resisted, and God left you. If you wish him to remain, you 
must yield to his softest and gentlest motions, and watch to learn 
what he would have you do, and yield yourself up to his guidance. 

8. Christians ought to be willing to make any sacrifice to 
enjoy the presence of the Spirit. Said a woman in high life, 
a professor of religion, " I must either give up hearing such a 
minister (naming him) preach, or I must give up my gay com- 
pany." She gave up the preaching and staid away. How 
different from another case ! 

A woman in the same rank of life heard the same minister 
preach, and went home resolved to abandon her gay and 
worldly manner of life — dismissed most of her attendants — 
changed her whole mode of dress, of equipage, of living, and 
of conversation ; so that her gay and worldly friends were 
soon willing to leave her to the enjoyment of communion with 
God, and free to spend her time in doing good, 



BE FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT. 11 7 

9. You see from this, that it must be very difficult for those 
in fashionable life to go to heaven. What a calamity to be 
in such circles! Who can enjoy the presence of God in 
them? 

10. See how crazy those are who are scrambling to get up 
to these circles, enlarging their houses, changing their style of 
living, furniture, etc. It is like climbing up mast-head to be 
thrown off into the ocean. To enjoy God, you must come 
down, not go up there. God is not there, among all the starch 
and flattery of high life. 

11. Many professors of religion are as ignorant of spiritual- 
ity as Nicodemus was of the new birth. They are ignorant, 
and I fear unconverted. If any body talks to them about the 
spirit of prayer, it is all algebra to them. The case of such 
professors is awful. How different was the character of the 
apostles ! Bead the history of their lives, read their letters, 
and you will see ' that they were always spiritual, and walked 
daily with God, But now how little is there of such religion ! 
"When the Son of Man cometh, will he find faith on the 
earth ? " Set some of these professors to work in a revival, 
and they do not know what to do, have no energy, no skill, and 
make no impression. When will professors of religion set 
themselves to work fc filled with the Spirit ? If I could see this 
church filled with the Spirit, I would ask nothing more to 
move this whole mighty mass of minds. Not two weeks would 
pass before the revival would spread all over this city. 



LECTUKE VIII. 

MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 

Text.— "Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching 
any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in 
heaven. 1 '— Matthew xviii. 10. 

Hitherto, in treating of the subject of Prayer, I have con- 
fined my remarks to secret prayer. I am now to speak of 
social prayer, or prayer offered in company, where two or 
more are united in praying. Such meetings have been com- 
mon from the time of Christ, and even hundreds of years 
before. And it is probable that God's people have always 
been in the habit of making united supplication, whenever 
they had the privilege. The propriety of the practice will not 
be questioned here. I need not dwell now on the duty of 
social prayer. Nor is it my design to discuss the question, 
whether any two Christians agreeing to ask any blessing, will 
be sure to obtain it. My object is to make some remarks on 

meetings for prayer, 

L The design of Prayer Meetings. 
HE. The manner of conducting them. 

HI. Mention several things that will defeat the design of 
holding them. 

I. TEE DESIGN OF PRAYER MEETINGS. 

1. One design of assembling several persons together for 
united prayer, is to promote union among Christians. Noth- 
ing tends more to cement the hearts of Christians than pray- 
ing together. Never do they love one another so well as when 
they witness the outpouring of each other's hearts in prayer. 
Their spirituality begets a feeling of union and confidence, 
highly important to the prosperity of the church. It is 
doubtful whether Christians can ever be otherwise than 
united, if they are in the habit of really praying together. 
And where they have had hard feelings and differences 
among themselves, they are ail done away, by uniting in 
(118) 



MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 119 

prayer. The great object is gained, if you can bring them 
really to unite in prayer. If this can be done, the difficulties 
vanish. 

2. To extend the spirit of prayer. God has so constituted 
us, and such is the economy of his grace, that we are sympa- 
thetic beings, and communicate our feelings to each other. 
A minister, for instance, will often as it were breathe his own 
feelings into his congregation. The Spirit of God that in- 
spires his soul, makes use of his feelings to influence his hear- 
ers, just as much as he makes use of the words he preaches. 
So he makes use of the feelings of Christians. Nothing is 
more calculated to beget a spirit of prayer, than to unite in 
social prayer, with one who has the spirit himself ; unless 
this one should be so far ahead that his prayer will repel the 
rest. His prayer will awaken them, if m they are not so far be- 
hind as to revolt at it and resist it. " If they are anywhere 
near the standard of his feelings, his spirit will kindle, and 
burn, and spread all around. One individual in a church, that 
obtains a spirit of prayer, will often arouse a whole church, 
and extend the same spirit through the whole, and a general 
revival follows. 

3. Another grand design of social prayer, is to move God. 
Not that it changes the mind and feelings of God. "When 
we speak of moving God, as I have said in a former lecture, 
we do not mean that it alters the will of God. But when 
the right kind of prayer is offered by Christians, they are in 
such a state of mind, that it becomes proper for God to 
bestow a blessing. They are then prepared to receive it, 
and he gives because he is always the same, and always 
ready and happy to show mercy. When Christians are 
united, and praying as they ought, God opens the windows 
of heaven, and pours out his blessings till there is not room 
to receive them. 

4. Another important design of prayer meetings is the con- 
viction and conversion of sinners. When properly conducted, 
they are eminently calculated to produce this effect. Sinners 
are apt to be solemn when they hear Christians pray. Where 
there is a spirit of prayer, sinners must feel. An ungodly 
man, a Universalist, once said respecting a certain minister, 
" I can bear his preaching very well, but when he prays, I feel 
awfully ; I feel as if God was coming down upon me." Sin- 
ners are often convicted by hearing prayer. A young man 
of distinguished talents, known to many of you, said concern- 
ing a certain minister to whom before his conversion he had 
been very much opposed, " As soon as he began to pray, I 



120 MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 

began to be convicted, and if he had continued to pray much 
longer, I should not have been able to contain nryself." Just 
as soon as Christians begin to pray as they ought, sinners 
then know that they pray, and they feel awfully. They do 
not understand what spirituality is, because they have no ex- 
perience of it. But when such prayer is offered, they know 
there is something in it ; they know God is in it, and it 
brings them near to God ; it makes them feel awfully sol- 
emn, and they cannot bear it. And not only is it calculated 
to impress the minds of sinners, but when Christians pray in 
faith, the Spirit of God is poured out, and sinners are melted 
down and converted on the spot. 

II. THE MANNER OF CONDUCTING PRAYER MEETINGS. 

1. It is often well to open a prayer meeting by reading a 
short portion of the word of God ; especially if the person 
who takes the lead of the meeting, can call to mind any por- 
tion that will be applicable to the object or occasion, and that 
is impressive, and to the point. If he has no passage that is 
applicable, he had better not read any at all. Do not drag in 
the word of God to make up part of the meeting as a mere 
matter of form. This is an insult to God. It is not well to 
read any more than is applicable to the subject before the 
meeting, or the occasion. Some people think it always nec- 
essary to read a whole chapter? though it may be ever so 
long, and have a variety of subjects. It is just as impressive 
and judicious to read a whole chapter, as it would be for a 
minister to take a whole chapter for his text, when his object 
was to make some particular truth bear on the minds of 
his audience. The design of a prayer meeting should be 
to bring Christians to the point to pray for a definite object. 
Wandering over a large field, hinders ^xnd destroys this 
design. 

2. It is proper that the person who leads should make 
some short and appropriate remarks, calculated to explain 
the nature of prayer, and the encouragements we have to 
pray, and to bring the object to be prayed for directly before the 
minds of the people. 

A man can no more pray without having his thoughts con- 
centrated, than he can do anything else. The person lead- 
ing, should therefore see to this, by bringing up before their 
minds the object they came to pray for. If they came to 
pray for any object he can do this. And if they did not, they 
had better go home. It is of no use to stay there and mock 



MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 121 

God, by pretending to pray, when they have nothing on earth 
to pray for. 

After stating the object, he should bring up some promise 
or some principle, as the ground of .encouragement to expect 
an answer to their prayers. If there is any indication of 
Providence, or any promise, or any principle in the Divine 
government that affords a ground of faith, let him call it to 
mind, and not let them be talking out of their own hearts at 
random, without knowing any solid reason to expect an an- 
swer. One reason why prayer meetings mostly accomplish 
so little, is because there is so little common sense exercised 
about them. Instead of looking round for some solid footing 
on which to repose their faith, they just come together and 
pour forth their words, and neither know nor care whether 
they have any reason to expect an answer. If they are going 
to pray about anything concerning which there can be any 
doubt or any mistake, in regard to the ground of faith, 
they should be shown the reason there is for believing that 
their prayers will be heard and answered. It is easy to see, 
that unless something like this is done, three-fourths of 
them will have no idea of what they are doing, or of the 
ground on which they should expect to receive what they 
pray for. 

3. In calling on persons to pray, it is always desirable to let 
things take their own course wherever it is safe. If it can be 
left so with safety, let those pray who are most inclined to 
pray. It sometimes happens that even those who are ordina- 
rily the most spiritual, and most proper to be called on, are 
not at the time in a suitable frarue ; they may be cold and 
worldly, and only freeze the meeting. But if you let those 
pray who desire to pray, you avoid this. But often this can- 
not be done with safety, especially in large cities, where a 
prayer meeting might be liable to be interrupted by those who 
have no business to pray ; some fanatic or crazy person, some 
hypocrite or enemy, who would only make a noise. In most 
places, however, this course may be taken with perfect safety. 
Give up the meeting to the Spirit of God. Those who desire 
to pray, let them pray. If the leader sees any thing that 
needs to be set right, let him remark, freely and kindly, and 
put it right, and then go on again. Only, he should be careful 
to time his remarks, so as not to interrupt the flow of feeling, or 
to chill the meeting, or turn off the minds from the proper subj ect. 

4 If it is necessary to name the individuals w T ho are to pray, 
it is best to call on those who are most spiritual first. And 
if you do not know who they are, then those whom you would 
6 



122 MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 

naturally suppose to be most alive. If they pray at the out- 
set, they will be likely to spread the spirit of prayer through 
the meeting, and elevate the tone of the whole. Otherwise, if 
you call on those who are cold and lifeless at the beginning, 
they will be likely to diffuse a chill throughout the meeting. 
The only hope of having an efficient prayer meeting is when 
at least a part of the church is spiritual, and they infuse their 
spirit into the rest. This is the very reason why it is often 
best to let things take their course, for then those who have 
the most feeling are apt to pray first, and give character to 
the meeting. 

5. The prayers should always be very short. When individ- 
uals suffer themselves to pray long, they forget where they 
are, that they are only the mouth of the congregation, and that 
the congregation cannot be expected to sympathise with them, 
so as to go along and feel united in prayer, if they are long 
and tedious, and go all around the world and pray for every 
thing they can think of. Commonly, those who pray long in 
meeting, do it not because they have the spirit of prayer, but 
because they have not. And they go round and round, not 
because they are full of prayer. Some men will spin out a 
long prayer in telling God who and what he is, or they exhort 
God to do so and so. Some pray out a whole system of di- 
vinity. Some preach, some exhort the people, till every body 
wishes they would stop, and God wishes so too, undoubtedly. 
They should keep to the point, and pray for what they came 
to pray for, and not follow the imagination of their own foolish 
hearts all over the universe. 

6. Each one should pray for some one object. It is well for 
every individual to have one object for prayer : two or more 
may pray for the same thing, or each a separate object. If 
the meeting is convened to pray for some specific thing, let 
them all pray for that. If its object is more general, let them 
select their subjects, according as they feel interested in them. 
If one feels particularly disposed to pray for the church, let 
him do it. If the next feels disposed to pray for the church, 
he may do so too. Perhaps the next will feel inclined to pray 
for sinners ; for the youth ; to confess sin ; let him do it, and 
as soon as he has got through let him stop. Whenever a man 
has deep feeling, he always feels on some particular point, 
and if he prays for that he will speak out of the abundance of 
his heart, and then he will naturally stop when he is done. 
Those who feel most, will be most ready to confine their 
prayers to that point, and stop when they have done and not 
pray ail over the world. 



MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 123 

7. If in the progress of the meeting it becomes necessary to 
change the object of prayer, let the man who leads state the 
fact, and explain it in a few words. If the object is to pray 
for the church, or for backsliders, or sinners, or the heathen, 
let him state it plainly, and then turn it over and hold it up 
before them till he brings them to think and feel deeply be- 
fore they pray. Then state to them the grounds on which 
they may repose their faith in regard to obtaining the bless- 
ings they pray for, if any such statement is needed, and so 
lead them right up to the throne, and let them take hold of 
the hand of God. This is according to the philosophy of the 
mind. People always do it for themselves when they pray in 
secret, if they really mean to pray to any purpose. And so it 
should be in prayer meetings. 

8. It is important that the time should be fully occupied, so 
as not to leave long seasons of silence. This always makes a 
bad impression and chills the meeting. I know that some- 
times churches have seasons of silent prayer. But in those 
cases they should be specially requested to pray in silence, so 
that all may know why they are silent. This often has a 
most powerful effect, where a few moments are spent by a 
whole congregation in silence, while all lift up their thoughts 
to God. This is very different from having long intervals of 
silence because there is nobody to pray. Every one feels that 
such a silence is like the cold damp of death over the meeting. 

9. It is exceedingly important that he who leads the meet- 
ing should press sinners who may be present to immediate 
repentance. He should crowd this hard, and urge the Chris- 
tians present to pray in such a way as to make sinners feel 
that they are expected to repent immediately. This tends to 
inspire Christians with compassion and love for souls. The 
remarks made to sinners are often like pouring fire upon the 
hearts of Christians, to awaken them to prayer and effort for 
their conversion. Let them see and feel the guilt and danger 
of sinners right among them, and then they will pray. 

III. I am to mention several things which may defeat the 
design of a prayer meeting, 

1. When there is an unhappy want of confidence in the 
leader, there is no hope of any good. Whatever the cause 
may be, whether he is to blame or not, the very fact that he 
leads the meeting will cast a damp over it and prevent all 
good. I have witnessed it in churches, where there was some 
offensive elder or deacon, perhaps justly offensive, and per- 
haps not, set to lead the prayer meeting, and the meeting 
would all die under his influence. If there is a want of conn- 



124 MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 

dence in regard to his piety, or in his ability, or in his judg- 
ment, or in anything connected with the meeting, everything 
he says or does will fall to the ground. The same thing often 
takes place where the church have lost confidence in the min- 
ister. 

2. Where the leader lacks spirituality, there will be a. dryness 
and coldness in his remarks and prayers, and every thing 
will indicate his want of unction, and his whole influence will 
be the very reverse of what it ought to be. I have known 
churches where a prayer meeting could not be sustained, and 
the reason was not obvious, but those who understood the 
state of things knew that the leader was so notorious for his 
want of spirituality, that he would inevitably freeze a prayer 
meeting to death. In many Presbyterian churches the elders 
are so far from being spiritual men that they always freeze a 
prayer meeting. And then they are often amazingly jealous 
for their dignity, and cannot bear to have any body else lead 
the meeting. And if any member that is spiritual takes the 
lead of a prayer meeting, they will take him to task for it : 
" Why, you are not an elder, and ought not to lead a prayer 
meeting in presence of an elder." And thus they stand in the 
way, while the whole church is suffering' under their blighting 
influence. 

A man who knows he is not in a spiritual frame of mind 
has no business to conduct a prayer meeting ; he will kill it. 
There are two reasons : First, he will have no spiritual discern- 
ment, and will not know what to do, or when to do it. A per- 
son who is spiritual can see the movements of Providence, 
and can feel the Spirit of God, and understand what he is 
leading them to pray for, so as to time his subjects, and take 
advantage of the state of feeling among Christians. He will 
not overthrow all the feeling in a meeting by introducing other 
things that are incongruous or ill-timed. He has spiritual 
discernment to understand the leadings of the Spirit, and his 
workings in those who pray, and to follow on as the Spirit 
leads. Suppose an individual leads who is not spiritual, and 
there are two or three prayers, and the spirit of prayer rises, 
but the leader has no spiritual discernment to see it, and he 
makes some remarks on another point, or reads a piece out 
of some book, that is as far from the feeling of the meeting as 
the north pole. It may be just as evident to others what they 
are called to pray for, as if the Son of God himself had come 
into the meeting and named the subject ; but the leader will 
overthrow it all, because he is so stupid that he does not know 
the indications of the meeting. 



MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 125 

And then, if the leader is not spiritual, he will very likely 
be dull and dry in his remarks and in all his exercises. He 
will read a long hymn in a dreamy manner, and then read a 
long passage of Scripture, in a tone so cold and wintry that 
he will spread a wintry pail over the meeting, and it will be 
dull as long as his cold heart is placed up in front of the 
whole thmg. 

3. A want of suitable talents in the leader. If he is wanting 
in that kind of talents which are fitted to make a meeting use- 
ful, he will injure the meeting. If he can say nothing, or if 
his remarks are so' out of the way as to produce levity or con- 
tempt, or if they have nothing in them that will impress the 
mind, or are not guided^by good sense, or not appropriate, he 
will injiu-e the meeting. A man may be pious, but so weak 
that his prayers do not edify, but rather disgust, the people 
present. When this is so, he had better keep silence. 

4. Sometimes the- benefit of a prayer-meeting is defeated 
by a bad spirit in the leader. For instance when there is a 
revival, and a great opposition, if a leader gets up in a prayer 
meeting and speaks of instances of opposition, and comments 
upon them, and thus diverts the meeting away from the ob- 
ject they come to pray for, he knows not what spirit he is of. 
Its effect is always ruinous to a prayer meeting. Let a min- 
ister in a revival come out and preach against the opposition, 
and he will infallibly destroy the revival, and turn the hearts 
of Christians away from their proper object. Let the man 
who is set to lead the church be careful to guard his own 
spirit, lest he should mislead the church, and diffuse a wrong 
temper. The same will be true, if any one who is called upon 
to speak or pray, introduces in his remarks or prayers any- 
thing controversial, impertinent, unreasonable, unscriptural, 
ridiculous or irrelevant. Any of these things will quench the ten- 
der breathings of the spirit of prayer, and destroy the meeting. 

5. Persons coming late to the meeting. This is a very great 
hindrance to a prayer meeting. "When people have begun to 
pray, and then- attention is fixed, and they have shut their eyes 
and closed their ears, to keep out everything from their minds, 
in the midst of a prayer somebody will come bolting in and 
walk up through the room. Some will look up, and all have 
then' minds interrupted for the moment. Then they all get 
fixed again, and another comes in, and so on. Why, I sup- 
pose the devil would not care how many Christians went to a 
prayer-meeting, if they will only go after the meeting is begun. 
He would be glad to have ever so many go scattering along 
so, and dodging in very piously after the meeting is begun. 



126 MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 

6. When persons make cold prayers, and cold confessions 
of sin, they are sure to quench the spirit of prayer. "When 
the influences of the Spirit are enjoyed, in the midst of the 
warm expressions that are flowing forth, let an individual 
come in who is cold, and pour his cold breath out, like the 
damp of death, and it will make every Christian that has any 
feeling want to get out of the meeting. 

7. In some places it # is common to begin a prayer meeting 
by reading a long portion of Scripture. Then the deacon or 
elder gives out a long hymn. Next, they sing it. Then he 
prays a long prayer, praying for the Jews and the fullness of 
the Gentiles, and many other objects that have nothing to do 
with the occasion of the meeting. After that perhaps he reads 
a long extract from some book or magazine. Then they have 
another long hymn and another long prayer, and then they 
go home. I once heard an elder say, they had kept up a 
prayer meeting so many years, and yet there had been no re- 
vival in the place. The truth was, that the officers of the 
church had been accustomed to carry on the meetings in just 
such a dignified way, and their dignity would not allow any- 
thing to be altered. No wonder there was no revival. Such 
prayer meetings are enough to hinder a revival. And if ever so 
many revivals should commence, the prayer meeting would 
destroy them. There was a prayer meeting once in this city, 
as I have been told, where there appeared to be some feeling, 
and some one proposed that they should have two or three 
prayers in succession, without rising from their knees. One 
dignified man present opposed it, and said that they never 
had done so, and he hoped there would be no innovations. 
He did not approve of innovations. And that was the last 
of the revival. Such persons have their prayer meetings 
stereotyped, and they are determined not to turn out of their 
track, whether they have the blessing or not. To allow any 
such thing would be a new measure, and they never like new 
measures. 

8. A great deed of singing often injures a prayer meeting. 
The agonizing spirit of prayer does not lead people to sing. 
There is a time for everything ; a time to sing, and a time to 
pray. But if I know what it is to travail in birth for souls, 
Christians never feel less like singing, than when they have the 
spirit of prayer for sinners. Singing is the natural expression 
of feelings that are joyful and cheerful. The spirit of prayer 
is not a spirit of joy. It is a spirit of travail, and agony of 
soul, supplicating and pleading with God with strong cryings, 
and groanings that cannot be uttered. This is more like any- 



MEETIXGS FOE PRAYER. 127 

thing else than it is like singing. I have known states of 
feeling, where you could not distress the people of God more 
than to begin to sing. It would be so entirely different from 
their feelings. Why, if you knew your house was on fire, 
would you first stop and sing a hymn before you put it out ? 
How would it look here in New York, when a building was 
on fire, and the firemen are all collected, for the foreman to 
stoji and sing a hymn ? It is just about as natural for the 
people to sing when exercised with a spirit of prayer. When 
people feel like pulling men out of the fire, they do not feel 
like singing. I never knew a singing revival amount to much. 
Its tendency is to do away all deep feeling. It is true 
that singing a hymn has sometimes produced a powerful 
effect upon sinners who are convicted, but in general it is the 
perfect contrast there is between their feelings and those of 
the happy souls who sing, that produces the effect If the 
hymn be of a joyful character it is not directly calculated to 
benefit sinners, and is highly fitted to relieve the mental an- 
guish "of the Christian, so as to destroy that travail of soul 
which is indispensable to his prevailing in prayer. 

When singing is introduced in a prayer-meeting, the hymns 
should be short, and so selected as to bring out something 
solemn ; some striking words, such as the Judgment Hymn, 
and others calculated to produce an effect on sinners ; or 
something that will produce a deep impression on the minds 
of Christians ; but not that joyful kind of singing, that makes 
every body feel comfortable, and turns off the mind from the 
object of the prayer meeting. 

• I once heard a celebrated organist produce a remarkable 
effect in a protracted meeting. The organ was a powerful 
one, and the double bass pipes were like thunder. The hymn 
was given out that has these lines : 

See the storm of vengeance gathering 

O'er the path you dare to tread ; 
" Hear the awful thunder rolling, 

Loud and louder o'er your head." 

When he came to these words, we first heard the distant roar 
of thunder, then it grew nearer and louder, till at the word 
"louder," there was a crash that seemed almost to overpower 
the whole congregation. 

_ Such things in their proper place do good. But common 
singing dissipates feeling. It should always be such as not to 
take away feeling, but to deepen it. 

Often a prayer meeting is injured by calling on the young 



128 MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 

converts to sing joyful hymns. This is highly improper in a 
prayer meeting. It is no time for them to let feeling flow 
away in joyful singing, while so many sinners around them, 
and their own former companions, are going down to hell. 
A revival is often put down by the church and minister all 
giving themselves up to singing with young converts. Thus 
by stopping to rejoice, when they ought to feel more and more 
deeply for sinners, they grieve away the Spirit of God, and 
they soon find that their agony and travail of soul are all gone. 

9. Introducing subjects of controversy into prayer will defeat 
a prayer meeting. Nothing of a controversial nature should 
be introduced into prayer, unless it is the object of the meet- 
ing to settle that thing. Otherwise, let Christians come together 
in their prayer-meetings, on the broad ground of offering 
united prayer for a common object. And let controversies be 
settled somewhere else. 

10. Great pains should be taken, both by the leader and 
others, to watch namvivly the motions of the Spirit of God. Let 
them not pray without the Spirit, but follow his leadings. Be 
sure not to quench the Spirit for the sake of praying accord- 
ing to the regular custom. Avoid everything calculated to 
divert attention away from the object. All affectation of feel- 
ing that is not real, should be particularly guarded against. 
If there is an affectation of feeling, most commonly others see 
and feel that it is affectation, not reality. At any rate, the 
Spirit of God knows it, and will be grieved, and leave the 
place. On the other hand, all resistance to the Spirit will 
equally destroy the meeting. Not unfrequently it happens, 
that there are some so cold that if any one should break out 
in- the spirit of praygr, they would call it fanaticism, and per* 
haps break out in opposition. 

11. If individuals refuse to pray when they are called on it 
injures a prayer-meeting. There are some people, who al- 
ways pretend they have no gifts. Women sometimes refuse 
to take their turn in prayer, and pretend they have not ability 
to pray. But if any one else should say so, they would be offend- 
ed. Suppose they should know that any other person had made 
such a remark as this, " Do not ask her to pray ; she cannot 
pray ; she has not talents enough ;" would they like it ? So 
with a man who pretends he has no gifts, let any one else re- 
port that he has not talents enough to make a decent prayer, 
and see if he will like it. The pretence is not sincere ; it is all 
a sham. 

Some say they cannot pray in their families, they have no 
gift. But a person could not offend them more than to say 



MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 129 

they cannot pray a decent prayer before their own families. 
They would say, "Why, the man talks as if he thought no- 
body else had any gifts but himself." People are not apt to 
have such a low opinion of themselves. I have often seen the 
curse of God follow such professors. They have no excuse. 
God will take none. The man has got a tongue to talk to his 
neighbors, and he can talk to God if he has any heart for it. 
You will see their children unconverted, their son a curse, 
their daughter — tongue cannot tell. God says he will pour 
out his fury on the families that call not on his name. If I 
had time, I could mention a host of facts to show that God 
MAKKS those individuals with his disapprobation and curse 
who refuse to pray when they ought. Until professors of 
religion will repent of this sin and take up the cross (if they 
choose to call praying a cross!) and do their duty, they need 
not expect a blessing. 

12. Prayer meetings are often too long. They should al- 
ways be dismissed while Christians have feeling, and not be 
spun out until all feeling is exhausted, and the Spirit is gone. 

13. Heartless confessions. People confess their sins and 
do not forsake them. Every week they will make the same 
confession over again. A long, cold, dull, stupid confession 
this week, and then the next week another just like it, without 
forsaking any sins. Why, they have no intention to forsake 
their sins ! It shows plainly that they do not mean to reform. 
All their religion consists in these confessions. Instead of 
getting a blessing from God by such confessions they will get 
only a curse. 

■ 14. When Christians spend all the time in praying for them- 
selves. They should have done this in their closets. When 
they come to a prayer meeting, they should be prepared to 
. offer effectual intercessions for others. If Christians pray in 
their closets as they ought, they will feel like praying for sin- 
ners. If they pray exclusively in tlieir closets for themselves, 
they will not get the spirit of prayer. I have known men 
shut themselves up for days to pray for themselves, and never 
get any life, because their prayers are all selfish. But if they 
will just forget themselves, and throw their hearts abroad, and 
pray for others, it will wake up such a feeling, that they can 
pour forth their hearts. And then they can go to work for 
souls. I knew an individual in a revival, who shut himself 
up seventeen days, and prayed as if he would have God come 
to his terms, but it would not do, and then he went out to 
work, and immediately he had the Sphit of God in his soul. 
It is well for Christians to prav for themselves, and confess 
6* 



130 MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 

their sins, and then throw their hearts abroad, till they feel 
as they ought. 

15. Prayer meetings are often defeated by the ivant of ap- 
propriate remarks. The things are not said which are calcu- 
lated to lead them to pray. Perhaps the leader has not pre- 
pared himself ; or perhaps he has not the requisite talents, 
to lead the church out in prayer, or he does not lead their 
minds to dwell on the appropriate topics of prayer. 

16. When individuals who are justly obnoxious for any 
cause, are forward in speaking and praying*. Such persons 
are sometimes very much set upon taking a pait. They say 
it is their duty to get up and testify for God on all occasions. 
They will say, they know they are not able to edify the church, 
but nobody else can do their duty, and they wish to testify. 
Perhaps the only place they ever did testify for God was in a 
prayer meeting ; all their lives, out of the meeting, testify 
against God. They had better keep still. 

17. Where persons take a part who are so illiterate that it 
is impossible persons of taste should not be disgusted. Per- 
sons of intelligence cannot follow them, and their minds are 
unavoidably diverted. I do not mean that it is necessary a 
person should have a liberal education in order to lead in 
prayer. All persons of common education, especially if they 
are in the habit of praying, can lead in prayer, if they have 
the spirit of prayer. But there are some persons who use such 
absurd and illiterate expressions, as cannot but disgust every 
intelligent mind. They cannot help being disgusted. The 
feeling of disgust is an involuntary thing, and when a dis- 
gusting object is before the mind, the feeling is irresistible. 
Piety will not keep a person from feeling it. The only way 
is to take away the object. If such persons mean to do good, 
they had better remain silent. Some of them may feel griev- 
ed at not being called to take a part. But it is better that 
they should be kindly told the reason than to have the prayer 
meeting regularly injured, and rendered ridiculous by their 
performances. 

18. A want of union in prayer. When one leads the others 
do not follow, but are thinking of something else. Their 
hearts do not unite, do not say, Amen. It is as bad as if one 
should make a petition and another remonstrate against it. 
One asks God to do a thing, and the others ask him not to do 
it, or to do something else. 

19. Neglect of secret prayer. Christians who do not pray 
in secret, cannot unite with power in a prayer meeting, and 
cannot have the spirit of prayer. 



MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 131 



REMARKS. 



1. An illy conducted prayer meeting often does more hurt 
than good. In many churches, the general manner of con- 
ducting prayer meetings is such that Christians have not the 
least idea of the design or the power of such meetings. It 
is such as tends to keep down rather than to promote pious 
feeling and the spirit of prayer. 

2. A prayer meeting is an index to the state of religion in 
a church. If the church neglect the prayer meetings, or come 
and have not the spirit of prayer, you know of course that 
religion is low. Let me go into the prayer meeting, and I 
can always see the state of religion there. 

3. Every minister ought to know that if the prayer meet- 
ings are neglected, all his labors are in vain. Unless he can 
get Christians to attend the prayer meetings, all he can do 
will not bring up the state of religion. 

4. A great responsibility rests on him who leads a prayer 
meeting. If the prayer meeting be not what it ought to be, 
if it does not elevate the state of religion, he should go se- 
riously to work and see what is the matter, and get the spirit 
of prayer, and prepare himself to make such remarks as are 
calculated to do good and set things right. A leader has no 
business to lead prayer meetings, if he is not prepared, both 
in head and heart, to do this. I wish you, who lead the dis- 
trict prayer meetings of this church, to notice this point. 

5. Prayer meetings are the most difficult meetings to sus- 
tain as they ought to be. They are so spiritual, that unless 
the leader be peculiarly prepared, both in heart and mind, 
they will dwindle. It is in vain for the leader to complain 
that members of the church do not attend. In nine cases 
out of ten, it is the leader's fault, that they do not attend. If 
he felt as he ought, they would find the meetings so interest- 
ing, that they would attend of course. If he is so cold, and 
dull, and without spirituality, as to freeze every thing, no 
wonder people do not come to the meeting. Church officers 
often complain and scold because people do not come to the 
prayer meeting, when the truth is, they themselves are so 
cold that they freeze every body to death that comes. 

6. Prayer meetings are most important meetings for the 
church. It is highly important for Christians to sustain the 
prayer meetings : — 

(1.) To promote union. 

(2.) To increase brotherly love. 



132 MEETINGS FOR PRAYER. 

(3.) To cultivate Christian confidence. 
(4.) To promote their own growth in grace. 
(5.) To cherish and advance spirituality. 

7. Prayer meetings should be so numerous in the church, 
and be so arranged, as to exercise the gifts of every individ- 
ual member of the church- — male and female. Every one 
should have the opportunity to pray, and to express the 
feelings -of his heart, if he has any. The sectional prayer 
meetings of this church are designed to do this. And if 
they are too large for this, let them be divided, so as to 
bring the entire mass into the work, to exercise all gifts, 
and diffuse union, confidence, and brotherly love through the 
whole. 

8. It is important that impenitent sinners should always at- 
tend prayer meetings. If none come of their own accord, go 
out and invite them. Christians ought to take great pains to 
induce their impenitent friends and neighbors to come to 
prayer meetings. They can pray better for impenitent sin- 
ners when they have them right before their eyes. I have 
known female prayer meetings exclude sinners from the meet- 
ing. And the reason was, they were so proud they were 
ashamed to pray before sinners. What a spirit ! Such pray- 
ers will do no good. They insult God. You have not done 
enough, by any means, when you have gone to the prayer 
meeting yourself. You cannot pray, if you have invited no 
sinner to go. If all the church have neglected their duty so, 
and have gone to the prayer meeting, and taken no sinners 
along with them, no subjects of prayer — what have they come 
for? 

9. The great object of all the means of grace is to aim di- 
rectly at the conversion of sinners. You should pray that 
they may be converted tJiere. Not pray that they may be 
awakened and convicted, but pray that they may be conver- 
ted on the spot. No one should either pray or make any re- 
marks, as if he expected a single sinner would go away with- 
out giving his heart to God You should all make the im- 
pression on his mind, that NOW he must submit. And if you 
do this, while you are yet speaking God will hear. If 
Christians make it manifest that they have really set their 
hearts on the conversion of sinners, and are bent upon it, and 
pray as they ought, there would rarely be a prayer meeting 
held without souls being converted, and sometimes every sin- 
ner in the room. That is the very time, if ever, that sinners 
should be converted in answer to those prayers. I do not 
doubt but that you may have sinners converted in every sec- 



MEETINGS FOB PRAYER. 133 

tional prayer meeting, if you do your duty. Take them there, 
take your families, your friends, or your neighbors there with 
that design, give them the proper instruction, if they need 
instruction, and pray for them as you ought, and you will 
save then souls. Rely upon it, if you do your duty, in a 
right manner, God will not keep back his blessing, and the 
work will be done. 



LECTUBE IX. 

MEANS TO BE USED WITH. SINNERS. 

Text.— Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord, and my servant whom I have 
chosen. — Isaiah xliii : 10. 

In the text it is affirmed of the children of God, that they 
are his witnesses. In several preceding lectures I have been 
dwelling on the subject of Prayer, or that department of 
means for the promotion of a revival, which is intended to 
move God to pour out his Spirit. I am now to commence 
the other department : 

MEANS TO BE USED FOR THE CONVICTION AND CONVERSION OF 

SINNERS. 

It is true, in general, that persons are affected by the sub- 
ject of religion, in projoortion to their conviction of its truth. 
Inattention to religion is the great reason why so little is felt 
concerning it. No being can look at the great truths of relig- 
ion, as truths, and not feel deeply concerning them. The devil 
cannot. He believes and trembles. Angels in heaven feel in 
view of these things. God feels. An intellectual conviction 
of truth is always accompanied w T ith feeling of some kind. 

One grand design of God in leaving Christians in the world 
after their conversion, is that they may be witnesses for God. 
It is that they may call the attention of the thoughtless mul- 
titude to the subject, and make them see the difference in the 
character and destiny of those who believe and those who re- 
ject the Gospel. This inattention is* the grand difficulty in the. 
way of promoting religion. And what the Spirit of God does 
is to awaken the attention of men to the subject of their sin 
and the plan of salvation. Miracles have sometimes been 
employed to arrest the attention of sinners. And in this way, 
miracles may become instrumental in conversion, although 
conversion is not itself a miracle, nor do miracles themselves 
ever convert any body. They may be the means of awaken- 
ing. Miracles are not always effectual even in that. And if 
continued or made common, they would soon lose their power. 
What is wanted in the world is something that can be a sort 
(134) . 



MEANS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 135 

of omnipresent miracle, able not only to arrest attention but 
to fix it, and keep the mind in warm contact with the truth, 
till it yields. 

Hence we see why God has scattered his children every- 
where, in families and among the nations. He never would 
suffer them to be altogether in one place, however agreeable 
it might be to their feelings. He wishes them scattered. 
When the church at Jerusalem herded together, neglecting to 
go forth as Christ had commanded, to spread the Gospel all 
over the world, God let loose a persecution upon them and 
scattered them abroad, and then "they went everywhere 
preaching the Gospel/' In examining the text, I propose to 
inquire. 

I. To what particular points Christians are to testify for 
God. 

II. The manner in which they are to testify. 

I. To what points are the children of God required to tes- 
tify ? 

Generally, they are to testify to the truth of the Bible. They 
are competent witnesses to this, for they have experience of 
its truth. The experimental Christian has no more need of 
external evidence to prove the truth of the Bible to his mind, 
than he has to prove his own existence. The whole plan 
of salvation is so fully spread out and settled in his convic- 
tion, that to undertake to reason him out of his belief ill the 
Bible would be a thing as impracticable as to reason liim out 
of the belief in his own existence. Men have tried to awaken 
a doubt of the existence of the material world. But they can- 
not succeed. No man can doubt the existence of a material 
world. To doubt it, is against his own consciousness. You 
may use arguments that he cannot answer, and may puzzle 
and perplex him, and shut up his mouth ; he may be no logi- 
cian or philosopher, and unable to detect your fallacies. But 
what he knows he knows. 

So it is in religion. The Christian is conscious that the 
Bible is true. The veriest child in religion knows by his ex- 
perience the truth of the Bible. He may hear objections from 
infidels, that he never thought of, and that he cannot answer, 
and he may be confounded, but he cannot be driven from his 
ground. He will say, " I cannot answer you, but I know the 
Bible is true." 

As if a man should look in a rnirror, and say, " That's my 
face." How do you know it is your face? "Why, by its 
looks." So when a Christian sees himself drawn and pictured 
forth in the Bible, he sees the likeness to be so exact, that he 



136 MEANS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 

knows it is true. But more particularly, Christians are to 
testify — 

1. To the immortality of the soul. This is clearly revealed 
in the Bible. 

2. The vanity and unsatisfying nature of all earthly good. 

3. The satisfying nature and glorious sufficiency of religion. 

4. The guilt and danger of sinners. On this point they can 
speak from experience as well as the word of God. They have 
seen their own sins, and they understand more of the nature 
of sin, and the guilt and danger of sinners. 

5. The reality of hell, as a place of eternal punishment for 
the wicked. 

6. The love of Christ for sinners. 

7. The necessity of a holy life, if we think of ever getting 
to heaven. 

8. The necessity of self-denial, and living above the world. 

9. The necessity of meekness, heavenly-mindedness, humil- 
ity, and integrity. 

10. The necessity of an entire renovation of character and 
life, for all who would enter heaven. These are the subjects 
on which they are to be witnesses for God. And they are 
bound to testify in such a way as to constrain men to believe 
the truth. 

11. How are they to testify ? 

By precept and example, on every proper occasion, by their 
lips, but mainly by their lives. Christians have no right to be 
silent with their lips ; they should rebuke, exhort, and entreat 
with all long-suffering and doctrine. But their main influence 
as witnesses is by their example. 

They are required to be witnesses in this way, because ex- 
ample teaches with so much greater force than precept. This 
is universally known. Actions speak louder than words. But 
where both precept and example are brought to bear, it brings 
the greatest amount of influence to bear upon the mind. As 
to the manner in which they are to testify ; the way in which 
they should bear witness to the truth of the points specified ; 
in general — they should live in their daily walk and conversa- 
tion, as if they believed the Bible. 

1. As if they believed the soul to be immortal, and as if they 
believed that death was not the termination of their existence, 
but the entrance into an unchanging state. They ought to live 
so as to make this impression full upon all around them. It is 
easy to see that precept without example on this point will do 
no good. All the arguments in the world will not convince 
mankind that you really believe this, unless you live as if you 



MEAJCS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 137 

believed it. Your reasoning may be unanswerable, but if you 
do not live accordingly, your practice will defeat your argu- 
ments. They will say you are an ingenious sophist, or an 
acute reasoner, and- perhaps admit that they cannot answer 
you ; but then they will say, it is evident that your reasoning 
is all false, and that you know it is false, because your life con- 
tradicts your theory. Or that, if it is true, you do not believe 
it, at any rate. And so all the influence of your testimony 
goes to the other side. 

2. The vanity and unsatisfying nature of the tilings of this 
world. You are to testify this by your life. The failure in 
this is the great stumbling block in the way of mankind. 
Here the testimony of God's children is needed more than any- 
where else. Men are so struck with the objecfs of sense, and 
so constantly occupied with them, that they are very apt to shut 
out eternity from their minds. A small object, that is held 
close to the eye, may shut out the distant ocean. So the things 
of the world, that are near, magnify so in their minds, that 
they overlook every thing else. One important design in keep- 
ing Christians in the world is to teach people on this point, 
practically, not to labor for the meat that perisheth. But sup- 
pose professors of religion teach the vanity of earthly things 
by precept, and contradict it in practice. Suppose the women 
are just as fond of dress, and just as particular in observing 
all the fashions, and the men as eager to have fine houses and 
equipage, as the people of the world. Who does not see that 
it would be quite ridiculous for them to testify with their lips, 
that this world is all vanity, and its joys unsatisfying and 
empty ? People feel this absurdity, and it is this that shuts 
up the lips of Christians. They are ashamed to speak to their 
neighbors, while they cumber themselves with these gewgaws, 
because their daily conduct testifies to every body the very 
reverse. How it would look for some of the church members 
in this city, male or female, to go about among the common 
people, and talk to them about the vanity of the world ! Who 
would believe what they say ? 

3. The satisfying nature of religion. Christians are bound 
to show by their conduct, that tlvey are actually satisfied with 
the enjoyments of religion, without the pomps and vanities of 
the world ; that the joys of religion and communion with God 
keep them above the world. They are to manifest that this 
world is not their home. Their profession is, that heaven is a 
reality, and that they expect to dwell there for ever. But sup- 
pose they contradict this by their conduct, and live in such a 
way as to prove that they cannot be happy unless they have a 



138 MEANS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 

full share of the fashion and show of the world, and that as 
for going to heaven, they had much rather remain on earth, 
than to die and go there ! What do the world think, when 
they see a professor of religion just- as much afraid to die as 
an infidel ? Such Christians perjure themselves — they swear 
to a he, for they testify that there is nothing in religion for 
which a person can afford to live above the world. 

4. The guilt and danger of sinners. Christians are bound 
to warn sinners of their awful condition, and exhort them to 
flee from the wrath to come, and lay hold on everlasting life. 
But who does not know that the manner of doing this is every- 
thing ? Sinners are often struck under conviction by the 
very manner of doing a thing. There was a man once very 
much opposed to a certain preacher. On being asked to 
specify some reason, he replied, " I can't bear to hear him, 
for he says the word HELL in such a way that it rings in 
my ears a long time afterwards." He was displeased -with 
the very thing that constituted the power of speaking that 
one word. The manner may be such as to convey an idea 
directly opposite to the meaning of the words. A man may 
tell you that your house is on fire in such a way as to make 
directly the opposite impression, and you will take for granted 
that it is not your house that is on fire. The watchman might 
sing out fire, fire, in such a way that every body would think 
he was either asleep or drunk. A certain manner is so usu- 
ally connected with the announcement of certain things that 
they cannot be expressed without that manner. The words 
themselves never alone convey the meaning, because the idea 
can only be fully expressed by a particular manner of speak- 
ing. Go to a sinner, and talk with him about his guilt and 
danger ; and if in your manner you make an impression that 
does not correspond, you in effect bear testimouy the other 
way, and tell him he is in no danger of hell. If the sinner 
believes at all that he is in danger of hell, it is wholly on 
other grounds than your saying so. If you live in such a 
way as to show that you do not feel compassion for sinners 
around you ; if you show no tenderness, by your eyes, your 
features, your voice ; if your manner is not solemn and earn- 
est, how can they believe you are sincere ? 

Woman, suppose you tell your unconverted husband, in an 
easy, laughing way, " My dear, I believe you are going to 
hell ; " will he believe you ? If your life is gay and trifling, 
you show that either you do not believe there is a hell, or that 
you wish to have him go there, and are trying to keep off 
every serious impression from his mind. Have you children 



MEANS TO BE USED "WITH SINNERS. 139 

that are unconverted ? Suppose you never say any thing to 
them about religion, or when you do talk to them it is in such 
a cold, hard, dry way as shows you have no feeling ; do you 
suppose they believe you ? They don't see the same coldness 
in you in regard to other things. They are in the habit of 
seeing all the mother in your eye, and in the tones of your 
voice, your emphasis, and the like, and feeling the warmth of 
a mother's heart as it flows out from your lips " on all that 
concerns them. If, then, when you talk to them on the sub- 
ject of religion, you are cold and trifling, can they suppose 
you believe it? If your deportment holds up before your 
child this careless, heartless, prayerless spirit, and then you 
talk to him about the importance of religion, the child will go 
away and laugh, to think you should try to persuade him 
there is a hell. 

5. The love of Christ. You are to bear witness to the re- 
ality of the love of Christ, by the regard you show for his 
precepts, his honor, his kingdom. You should act as if you 
believed that he died for the the sins of the whole world, and 
as if you blamed sinners for rejecting his great salvation. 
This is the only legitimate way in which you can impress sin- 
ners with the love of Christ. Christians, instead of this, 
often live so as to make the impression on sinners that 
Christ is so compassionate that they have very little to fear 
from him. I have been amazed to see how a certain class of 
professors want ministers to be always preaching about the 
love of Christ. If a minister preaches up duty, and urges 
Christians to be holy, and to labor for Christ, they call it all 
legal preaching. They say they want to hear the Gospel. 
Well, suppose you present the love of Christ. How will they 
bear testimony in their lives ? How will they show that they 
believe it ? Why, by conformity to the world, they will testify 
point blank, that they do not believe a word of it, and that they 
care nothing at all for the love of Christ, only to have it for 
a cloak, that they can talk about it, and so cover up their 
sins. They have no sympathy with his compassion, and no 
belief in it as a reality, and no concern for the feelings of 
of Christ, which fill his mind when he sees the condition of 
sinners. 

6. The necessity of holiness in order to enter heaven. It 
will not do to depend on talking about this. They must live 
holy, and thus testify that men need not expect to be saved, 
unless they are holy. The idea has so long prevailed that we 
canrwt be perfect here, that many professors do not so much as 
seriously aim at a sinless life. They cannot honestly say that 



140 'MEANS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 

they ever so much as really meant to live without sin. They 
drift along before the tide, in a loose, sinful, unhappy and 
abominable manner, at which, doubtless, the devil- faughs, 
because it is, of all others, the surest way to hell. 

7. The necessity of self-denial, humility, and heavenly-mind- 
edness. Christians ought to show by their own example what 
the religion is which is expected of men. That is the most 
powerful preaching, after all, and the most likely to have in- 
fluence on the impenitent, by showing them the great differ- 
ence between them and Christians. Many people are trying 
to make men Christians by a different course, by copying as 
near as possible their present manner of life, and conforming 
to them as much as will possibly do. They seem to think they 
can make men fall in with religion best by bringing religion 
down to their standard. As if the nearer you bring religion 
to the world, the more likely the world would be to embrace 
it. Now all this is as wide as the poles from the true phil- 
osophy of making Christians. But it is always the policy of 
carnal professors. And they think they are displaying won- 
derful sagacity and prudence by taking so much pains not to 
scare people at the mighty strictness and holiness of the Gos- 
pel. They argue that if you exhibit religion to mankind as 
requiring such a great change in their manner of life, such 
innovations upon their habits, such a separation from their 
old associates, why, you will drive them all away. This seems 
plausible at first sight. But it is not true. Let professors 
live in this lax and easy way, and sinners say, " Why, I do 
not see but I am about right, or at least so near right, that it 
is impossible God should send me to hell for the difference 
between me and these professors. It is true, they do a little 
more than I do, they go the communion table, and pray in 
their families, and a few such like little things, but they can 
not make any such great difference as heaven and hell." 
No, the true way is, to exhibit religion and the world in strong 
contrast, or you never can make sinners feel the necessity of 
a change. Until the necessity of this fundamental change is 
embodied and held forth in a strong light by example, how 
can you make men believe they are going to be sent to hell 
if they are not wholly transformed in heart and lif e ? 

This is not only true in philosophy, but it has been proved 
by the history of the world. Look at the missions of the 
Jesuits in Japan, by Francis Xavier and his associates. How 
they lived, what a contrast they showed between their reli- 
gion and the heathen, and what results followed ! Now I 
was reading a letter from one of our missionaries in the East, 



MEANS TO BE USED WITH PINNERS. 141 

who writes, I believe, to this effect, that a missionary must be 
able to rank with the English nobility, and so recommend his 
religion to the respect of the natives. He must get away up 
above them, so as to show a superiority, and thus impress 
them with respect ! Is this philosophy ? Is this the way to 
convert the world. You can no more convert the world in 
this way than by blowing a ram's horn. It has no tendency 
that way. What did the Jesuits do? They went about 
among the people in the daily practice of self-denial before 
their eyes, teaching, and preaching, and praying, and labor- 
ing, unwearied and unawed, mingling with every caste and 
grade, bringing down their instructions to the capacity of 
every individual. And in that way the mission carried idola- 
try before it like a wave of the sea, and all at once their re- 
ligion spread over the vast empire of Japan. And if they 
had not meddled with politics and brought themselves in 
needless collision with the government, no doubt they would 
have held their ground till this day. I am not saying any- 
thing in regard to the religion they taught, for I am not sure 
how much truth they preached with it. I speak only of their 
following the true policy of missions, by showing, by their 
lives, the religion they taught in wide contrast with a worldly 
spirit and the fooleries of idolatry. This one feature of their 
policy so commended itself to the consciences of the people 
that it was irresistible. If Christians contradict this one 
point, and attempt to accommodate their religion to the world- 
liness of men, they render the salvation of the world impos- 
sible. How can you make people believe that self-denial and 
separation from the world are necessary, unless you practise 
them? 

8. Meekness, humility, and heavenly-mindedness. The 
people of God should always show a temper like the Son of 
God, who when he was reviled, reviled not again. If a pro- 
fessor of religion is irritable, and ready to resent an injury, 
and fly in a passion, and take the same measures as the world 
do to get redress, by going to law and the like, how is he to 
make people believe there is any reality in a change of heart ? 
They cannot recommend religion while they have such a 
spirit. If you are in the habit of resenting injurious conduct ; 
if you do not bear it meekly, and put the best construction 
that can be on it, you contradict the Gospel. Some people 
always show a bad spirit, ever ready to put the worst construc- 
tion on what is done, and take fire at any little thing. This 
shows a great want of that charity which " hopeth all things, 
believeth all things, endureth all things." But if a man al- 



142 MEANS TO BE USED WITH SIXNERS. 

ways shows meekness under injuries, it will confound gain- 
saying. Nothing makes so solemn an impression upon sin- 
ners, and bears down with such a tremendous weight on their 
consciences, as to see a Christian, Christ-like bearing affronts 
and injuries with the meekness of a lamb. It cuts like a 
two-edged sword. 

I will mention a case to show this. A young man abused 
a minister to his face, and reviled him in an unprecedented 
manner. The minister possessed his soul in patience, and 
spoke mildly in reply, telling him the truth pointedly, but 
yet in a very kind manner. This, only made him the more 
angry, and at length he went away in a rage, declaring that 
he was not going to stay and bear this vituperation. As if it 
was the minister, instead of himself, that had been scolding. 
The sinner went away, but with the arrows of the Almighty 
in his heart, and in less than half an hour he followed the 
minister to his lodgings in intolerable agony, wept, and 
begged forgiveness, and broke down before God, and yielded 
up his heart to Christ. This calm and mild manner was 
more overwhelming to him than a thousand arguments. 
Now if that minister had been thrown off his guard, and an- 
swered harshly, no doubt he would have ruined the soul of 
that young man. How many of you have defeated- eveiy 
future effort you may make with your impenitent friends or 
neighbors, in some such way as this. On some occasion you 
have showed yourself so irascible, that you have sealed up 
your own lips, and laid a stumbling block over which that 
sinner will stumble into hell. If you have done it in any in- 
stance, do not sleep till you have done all you can to retrieve 
the mischief ; till you have confessed the sin and done every 
thing to counteract it as far as possible. 

9. The necessity of entire honesty in a Christian. Oh what 
afield opens here for remark ! But I cannot go over it fully 
now. It extends to all the departments of life. Christians 
need to show the strictest regard to integrity in every depart- 
ment of business, and in all their intercourse with their fel- 
low-men. If every Christian would pay a scrupulous regard 
to honesty, and always be conscientious to do exactly right, it 
would make a powerful impression on the minds of people of 
the reality of religious principle. 

A lady was once buying some eggs in a store, and the clerk 
made a miscount and gave her one more than the number. 
She saw it at the time, but said nothing, and after she got 
home it troubled her. She felt that she had acted wrong, 
and she went back to the young man and confessed it and 



MEANS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 143 

paid the difference. The impression of her conscientious in- 
tegrity went to his heart like a sword. It was a great sin in 
her to conceal the miscount, because the temptation was 
so small ; for if she would «cheat him out of an egg, it showed 
that she would cheat him out of his whole store, if she could 
do it and not be found out. But her prompt and humble con- 
fession showed an honest conscience. 

I am happy to say, there are some men who deal on this 
principle of integrity. And the wicked hate them for it. 
They rail against them, and vociferate in bar-rooms, that they 
never will buy goods of such and such individuals, that such 
a hypocrite shall never touch a dollar of their money, and all 
that, and then they will go right away and buy of them, be- 
cause they know they shall be honestly dealt with. This is a 
testimony to the truth of religion, that is heard from Georgia 
to Maine. Suppose all Christians did so, what would be the 
consequence ? Christians would run away with the business 
of the city. The Christians would soon do the business of 
the world. The great argument which some Christians urge, 
that if they do not do business upon the common principle, 
of stating one price and taking another, they cannot com- 
pete with men of the world, is all false — false in philosophy 
and false in history. Only make it your invariable rule to 
do right, and do business upon principle, and you control the 
market. The ungodly will be obliged to conform to your 
standard. It is perfectly in the power of the church to regu 
late the commerce of the world, if they only themselves main- 
tain perfect integrity. 

And if Christians will do the same in politics, they will 
sway the destinies of nations, without involving themselves at 
all in the base and corrupting strife of parties. Only let 
Christians generally determine to vote for no man for any 
office, that is not an honest man and a man of pure morals, 
and let it be known that Christians are united in this, what- 
ever may be their difference in political sentiments, and no 
man would be put up who is not such a character. In three 
years it would be talked about in taverns and published in 
newspapers, when, any man is set up as a candidate for office, 
"What a good man he is, how moral, how pious!" and the 
like. And any political party would no more set up a known 
Sabbath-breaker, or a gambler, or a profane swearer, or a 
whoremonger, or a rum-seller, as their candidate for office, 
than they would set up the devil himself for president. The 
carnal policy of many professors, who undertake to correct 
politics by such means as wicked men employ, and who are 



144 MEANS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 

determined to vote with a party, let the candidate be ever so 
profligate, is all wrong — wrong in principle, contrary to phi- 
losophy and common sense, and ruinous to the best interests 
of mankind. The dishonesty of Hxe church is cursing the 
world. I am not going to preach a political sermon, I assure 
you. But I want to show you, that if you mean to impress 
men favorably to your religion by your lives, you must be 
honest, strictly honest, in business, politics, and every 
thing you do. What do you suppose those ungodly politi- 
cians, who know themselves to be playing a dishonest game in 
carrying an election, think of your religion when they see you 
uniting with them ? They know you are a hypocrite ! 

REMARKS. 

1. It is unreasonable for professors of religion to wonder 
at the thoughtlessness of sinners. — Every thing considered, 
the carelessness of sinners is not wonderful. "We are affected 
by testimony, and only by that testimony which is received 
by our minds. Sinners are so taken up with business, plea- 
sure, and the things of the world, that they will not examine 
the Bible to find out what religion is. Their feelings are ex- 
cited only on worldly subjects, because these only are brought 
into warm contact with their minds. The things of the 
world make therefore a strong impression. But there is so 
little to make an impression on their minds in respect to 
eternity, and to bring religion home to them, that they do 
not feel on the subject, If they examined the subject they 
would feel. But they do not examine it, nor think upon it, 
nor care for it. And they never will, unless God's witnesses 
rise up and testify. But inasmuch as the great body of 
Christians in fact live so as to testify on the other side by their 
conduct, how can we expect that sinners will feel right on the 
subject ? Nearly all the testimony and all the influence that 
comes to their minds tends to make them feel the other way. 
God has left his cause here before the human race, and lef^ 
his witnesses to testify in his behalf, and behold, they turn 
round and testify the other way ! Is it any wonder that sin- 
ners are careless ? 

2. We see why it is that preaching does so little good ; 
and how it is that so many sinners get gospel-hardened. 
Sinners that live under the Gospel are often supposed to be 
gospel-hardened ; but only let the church wake up, and 
act consistently, and they will feel. If the church were to 
live only one week as if they believed the Bible, sinners 



MEANS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 145 

would melt down before them. Suppose I were a lawyer, 
and should go into court and spread out my client's case, the 
issue is joined, and I make my statements, and tell what I 
expect to prove, and then call in my witnesses. The first 
witness takes his oath, and then rises up and contradicts me 
to my face. What good will all my pleading do ? I might 
address the jury a month, and be as eloquent as Cicero, but 
so long as my witnesses contradicted me, all my pleading 
would do no good. Just so it is with a minister who is 
preaching in the midst of a cold, stupid, and God-dishonoring 
church. In vain does he hold up to view the great truths of 
religion, when every member of the church is ready to swear 
he hes. Why, in such a church, their very manner of going 
out of the aisles contradicts the sermon. They press out as 
cheerful and as easy, bowing to one and another, and whis- 
pering together, as if nothing was the matter. Let the min- 
ister warn every man daily with tears, it will produce no 
effect. If the devil should come in and see the state of 
things, he would think he could not better the business for 
his interest. 

Yet there are ministers who will go on in this way for 
years, preaching over the heads of such a people, that by 
their lives contradict every word they say, and they think it 
their duty to do so. Duty ! To preach to a church that are 
undoing all his work, and contradicting all his testimony, 
and that will not alter ! No. Let him shake off the dust 
from his feet for a testimony, and go to the heathen, or to 
the new settlements. The man is wasting his energies, and 
wearing out his life, and just rocking the cradle for a sleepy 
church, all testifying to sinners, there is no danger. Their 
whole lives are a practical testimony that the Bible is not 
true. Shall ministers continue to wear themselves out so ? 
Probably not less than ninety-nine-hundredths of the 
preaching in this country is lost, because it is contradicted 
by the church. Not one truth in a hundred that is preached 
takes effect, because the lives of professors testify that it is 
not so* 

3. It is evident that the standard of Christian living must 
be raised, or the world will never be converted. If we had as 
•many church members now as there are families, and scat- 
tered all over the world, and a minister to every five hundred 
souls, and every child in a Sabbath-school^ and every young 
person in a Bible-class, you would have all the machinery you 
want, but if the church contradict the truth by their lives, it 
never would produce a revival. 
7 



146 MEANS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 

They never will have a revival in any place while the 
whole church in effect testify against the minister. Often it 
is the case that where there is the most preaching, there is 
the least religion, because the church contradict the preach- 
ing. I never knew means fail of a revival where Christians 
lived consistently. One of the first things is to raise the 
standard of religion, so as to embody and hang out in the 
sight of all men, the truth of the Gospel. Unless ministers 
can get the church to wake up and act as if religion was true, 
and back their testimony by their lives, in vain will they at- 
tempt to promote a revival. 

Many churches are depending on their minister to do 
everything. When he preaches, they will say, "What a 
great sermon that was. He's an excellent minister. Such 
preaching must do good. We shall have a revival soon, I 
do not doubt." And all the while they are contradicting 
the preaching by their lives. I tell you, if they are depend- 
ing on preaching alone to carry on the work, they must fail. 
If Jesus Christ were to come and preach, and the church con- 
tradict it, he would fail. It has been tried once. Let an 
apostle rise from the dead, or an angel come down from 
heaven and preach, without the church to witness for God, 
and it would have no effect. The novelty might produce a 
certain kind of effect for a time, but as soon as the novelty 
was gone, the preaching would have no saving effect, while 
contradicted by the witnesses. 

4. Every Christian makes an impression by his conduct, 
and witnesses either for one side or the other. His looks, 
dress, whole demeanor, make a constant impression on one 
side or the other. He cannot help testifying for or against 
religion. He is either gathering with Christ, or scattering 
abroad. Every step you take, you tread on chords that will 
vibrate to all eternity. Every time you move, you touch keys 
whose sound will re-echo over all the hills and dales in heav- 
en, and through all the dark caverns and vaults of hell. Every 
moment of your lives, you are exerting a tremendous in- 
fluence, that will tell on the immortal interests of souls all 
around you. Are you asleep, while all your conduct is exert- 
ing such an influence ? 

Are you going to walk in the street ? Take care how you 
dress. What is ihat on your head ? What does that gaudy 
ribbon, and those ornaments upon your dress, say to every 
one that meets you ? It makes the impression that you wish 
to be thought pretty. Take care ! You might just as well 
write on your clothes, "NO TRUTH IN RELIGION." It 



MEANS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 147 

says, "GIVE ME DKESS, GIVE ME FASHION, GIVE 
ME FLATTEKY, AND I AM HAPPY." The world under- 
stand this testimony as you walk the streets. You are " liv- 
ing epistles, known and read of all men." If you show pride, 
levity, bad temper, and the like, it is like tearing open the 
wounds of the Saviour. How Christ might weep to see pro- 
fessors of religion going about hanging up his cause to con- 
tempt at the corners of streets. Only " let the women adorn 
themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobri- 
ety, not with broidered hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly ar- 
ray, but (which becometh women professing godliness) with 
good works ; " only let them act consistently, and their con- 
duct will tell on the world, heaven will rejoice and hell groan 
at their influence. But oh, let them display vanity, try to be 
pretty, bow down to the goddess of fashion, fill their ears 
with ornaments, and their fingers with rings. Let them put 
feathers in their hats, and clasps upon their arms, lace them- 
selves up till they can hardly breathe. Let them put on their 
"round tires and walk mincing as they go/' and their influ- 
ence is reversed. Heaven puts on the robes of mourning, and 
hell may hold a jubilee. 

5. It is easy to see why revivals do not prevail in a great 
city. How can they ? Just look at God's witnesses, and see 
what they are testifying to. They seem to be agreed togeth- 
er to tempt the Spirit of the Lord, and he to the Holy Ghost. 
They make their vows to God, to consecrate themselves 
wholly to him, and then go bowing down at the shrine of 
fashion, and then wonder there are no revivals. It would be 
more than a miracle to have a revival under such circumstan- 
ces. How can a revival prevail in this church ? Do you sup- 
pose I have such a vain imagination of my own ability, as to 
think I can promote a revival by preaching over your heads, 
while you live on as some of you do ? Do you not know 
that so far as your influence goes, many of you are right in 
the way of a revival ? Your spirit and deportment produce 
an influence on the world against religion. How shall the 
world believe religion, when the witnesses are not agreed 
among themselves? You contradict yourselves, you con- 
tradict one another, and you contradict your minister, and 
the sum of the whole testimony is, there is no need of being 
pious. 

Do you believe the things I have been preaching are true, 
or are they the ravings of a disturbed mind ? If they are 
true, do you recognize the fact that they have reference to 
you ? You say, perhaps, " I wish some of the rich churches 



148 MEANS TO BE USED WITH SINNERS. 

could hear it ! " Why, I am not preaching to them, I am 
preaching to you. My responsibility is to you, and my fruits 
must come from you. Now are you contradicting it ? What 
is the testimony on the leaf of the record that is now sealed 
for the judgment concerning this day ? Have you manifested 
a sympathy with the Son of God, when his heart is bleeding 
in view of the desolations of Zion ? Have your children, 
clerks, servants, seen it to be so ? Have they seen a solem- 
nity on your countenance, and tears in your eyes, in view of 
perishing souls ? 

Finally. — I must close by remarking, that God and all 
moral beings have great reason to complain of this false testi- 
mony. There is ground to complain that God's witnesses 
turn and testify point-blank against him. They declare by 
their conduct that there is no truth in the Gospel. Heaven 
might weep and hell rejoice to see this. Oh, how guilty ! Here 
you are, going to the judgment, red all over with blood. 
Sinners are to meet you there, those who have seen how you 
live, many of them already dead, and many others you will 
never see again. What an influence you have exerted ! Per- 
haps hundreds of souls will meet you in the judgment, and 
curse you (if they are allowed to speak) for leading them to 
hell, by practically denying the truth of the Gospel. What 
will become of this city, and of the world, when the church 
is united in practically testifying that God is a liar ? They 
testify by their lives, that if they make a profession and live 
a moral life, that is religion enough. Oh, what a doctrine of 
devils is that ! Enough to ruin the whole race ! 



LECTUEE X. 

TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 
Text. — He that winneth souls is wise. — Proverbs, xi. 30. 

The most common definition of wisdom is, that it is the 
choice of the best end and the selection of the most appropriate 
means for the accomplishment of that end — the best adapta- 
tion of means to secure a desired end. " He that winneth 
souls," God says, "is wise." The object of this evening's 
lecture is to direct Christians in the use of means for accom- 
plishing their infinitely desirable end, the salvation of souls. 
To-night I shall confine my attention to the private efforts of 
individuals for the conversion and salvation of men. On an- 
other occasion, perhaps I shall use the same text in speaking 
of what is wise in the public preaching of the Gospel, and 
the labors of ministers. In giving some directions to aid pri- 
vate Christians in this work, I propose, 

I. To show Christians how they should deal with careless 
sinners. 

II. How they should deal with awakened sinners. 

III. How they should deal with convicted sinners. 
I. The manner of dealing with careless sinners. 

1. In regard to the time. It is important that you should 
select a proper time to try to make a serious impression on the 
mind of a careless sinner. Much depends on timing your 
efforts right. For if you fail of selecting the most proper 
time, very probably you will be defeated. True, you may say, 
it is your duty at all times to warn sinners, and try to awaken 
them to think of their souls. And so it is ; yet if you do not 
pay due regard to the time and opportunity, your hope of 
success may be very doubtful. 

(1.) It is desirable, if possible, to address a person that is 
careless, when he is disengaged from other employments. In pro- 
portion as his attention is taken up with something else, it 
will be difficult to awaken him to religion. People who are 
careless and indifferent to religion are often offended, rather 
than benefited, by being called off from important and lawful 
business. For instance, a minister perhaps goes to visit the 
family of a merchant, or mechanic, or farmer, and finds the 

(149) 



150 TO A\TN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 

man absorbed in his business ; perhaps he calls him off from 
his work when it is urgent, and the man is uneasy and irri- 
table, and feels as if it was an intrusion. In such a case, 
there is little room to expect any good. Notwithstanding it 
is true that religion is infinitely more important than all his 
worldly business, and he ought to postpone everything to the 
salvation of his soul, yet he does not feel it, for if he did he 
would no longer be a careless sinner, and therefore he regards 
it as unjustifiable, and gets offended. You must take him as 
you find him, a careless, impenitent sinner, and deal with 
him accordingly. He is absorbed in other things, and very 
apt to be offended if you take such a time to interfere and 
call his attention to religion. 

(2.) It is important to take a person, if possible, at a time 
when he is not strongly excited with any other subject If that 
is the case, he is in an unfit frame to be addressed on the sub- 
ject of religion. In proportion to the strength of that excite- 
ment, would be the probability that you would do no good. 
You may possibly reach him ; persons have had their minds 
arrested and turned to religion in the midst of a powerful ex- 
citement on other subjects. But it is not likely. 

(3.) Be sure that the person imperfectly sober. It used to 
be more common than it is now for people to drink spirits 
every day, and become more or less intoxicated. Precisely in 
proportion as they are so, they are rendered unfit to be ap- 
proached on the subject of religion. If they have been drink- 
ing beer, or cider, or wine, so that you can smell their breath, 
you may know there is but little chance of producing any last- 
ing effect on them. I have had professors of religion bring 
persons to me, pretending they were under conviction ; for 
you know that people in liquor are often very fond of talking 
upon religion ; but as soon as I came near them, so as to 
smell their breath, I have asked, Why do you bring this 
drunken man to me ? Why, they say, he is not drunk, he has 
only drank a little. Well, that little has made him a little 
drunk. He is drunk if you can smell his breath. The cases 
are exceedingly rare where a person has been truly convicted, 
who had any intoxicating liquor in him. 

(4. ) If possible, where you wish to converse with a man on 
the subject of salvation, take him when he is in a good temper. 
If you find him out of humor, very probably he will get angry 
and abuse you. Better let him alone for that time, or you will 
be likely to quench the Spirit. It is possible you may be able 
to talk in such a way as to cool his temper, but it is not likely. 
The truth is, men hate God, and though their hatred may be 



TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 151 

dormant, it is easily excited, and if yon bring God fully before 
their minds when they are already excited with anger, it will 
be so much the easier to arouse their enmity to open violence. 

(5.) If possible, always take an opportunity to converse 
with careless sinners when they are done. Most men are too 
proud to be conversed with freely respecting themselves in the 
presence of others, even then- own family. A man in such 
circumstances will brace up all his powers to defend himself, 
while if he was alone he would melt down under the truth. 
He will resist the truth, or try to laugh it of£ for fear that if 
he should manifest any feeling somebody will go and report 
that he is serious. 

In visiting families, instead of calling the family together 
at the same time to be talked to, the better way is to see them 
all, one at a time. There was a case of this kind. Several 
young ladies, of a proud, gay, and fashionable character, lived 
together in a fashionable family. Two men were strongly de- 
sirous to get the subject of religion before them, but were at a 
loss how to accomplish it, for fear they would all combine, 
and counteract or resist every serious impression. At length 
they took this course. They called and sent up their card to 
one of the young ladies by name. She came down and they 
conversed with her on the subject of her salvation, and as she 
was alone, she not only treated them politely, but seemed to 
receive the truth with seriousness. A day or two after, they 
called in like manner on another, and then another, and so 
on, till they had conversed with every one separately. In a 
little time they were all, I believe, every one, hopefully con- 
verted. This was as it should be, for then they could not 
keep each other in countenance. And then the impression 
made on one was followed up with the others, so that one was 
not left to exert a bad influence over the rest. 

There was a pious woman who kept a boarding house for 
young gentlemen ; she had twenty-one or two of them in her 
family, and at length she became very anxious for their salva- 
tion ; she made it a subject of prayer, but saw no seriousness 
among them. At length she saw that there must be some- 
thing done besides praying, and yet she did not know what 
to do. One morning after breakfast, as they were retiring, 
she asked one of them to stop a few minutes. She took him 
to her room, and conversed with him tenderly on the subject 
of religion, and prayed with him. She followed up the im- 
pression made, and pretty soon he was hopefully converted. 
Then th&re were two, and they addressed another, and prayed 
with him, and soon he was prepared to join them. Then an- 



152 TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 

other, and so on, taking one at a time, and letting none of the 
rest know what was going on, so as not to alarm them, till 
every one of these young men was converted to God. Now 
if she had brought the subject before the whole of them to- 
gether, very likely they would have turned it all into ridicule ; 
or perhaps they would have been offended and left the house, 
and then she could have had no further influence over them. 
But taking one alone, and treating him respectfully and kindly, 
he had no such motive for resistance as arises out of the pres- 
ence of others. 

(6.) Try to seize an opportunity to converse with a careless 
sinner, when the events of Providence seem to favor your design. 
If any particular event should occur, calculated to make a se- 
rious impression, be sure to improve the occasion faithfully. 

(7.) Seize the earliest opportunity to converse with those 
around you who are careless. Do not put it off from day to 
day, thinking a better opportunity will come. You must seek 
an opportunity, and if none offers make one. Appoint a time 
and place, and get an interview with your friend and neighbor, 
where you can speak to him freely. Send him a note, go to 
him on purpose, make it look like a matter of business, as if 
you were in earnest in endeavoring to promote his soul's sal- 
vation. Then he will feel that it is a matter of importance, at 
least in your eyes. Follow it up till you succeed, or become 
convinced nothing can now be done. 

(8. ) If you have any feeling for a particular individual, take 
an opportunity to converse with that individual while this feel- 
ing continues. If it is truly a benevolent feeling, you have rea- 
son to believe the Spirit of God is moving you to desire the sal- 
vation of his soul, and that God is ready to bless your efforts 
for his conversion. In such a case, make it the subject of 
special and importunate prayer, and seek an early opportu- 
nity to pour out all your heart to him and bring him to 
Christ 

2. In regard to the manner of doing all this. 

(1.) When you approach a careless individual to endeavor 
to awaken him to his soul's concerns, be sure to treat him 
kindly. Let him see that you address him, not because you 
seek a quarrel with him, but because you love his soul, and 
desire his best good in time and eternity. If you are harsh 
and overbearing in your manner, you will probably offend 
him and drive him farther off from the way of life. 

(2.) Be solemn. Avoid all lightness of manner or language. 
Levity will produce any thing but a right impression. You 
ought to feel that you are engaged in a very solemn work, 



TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 153 

which is going to affect the character of your friend or neigh- 
bor, and probably determine his destiny for eternity. Who 
could trifle and use levity in such circumstances if his heart 
was sincere ? 

(3.) Tie respectful. Some seem to suppose it necessary to 
be abrupt, aud rude, and coarse in their intercourse with the 
careless and impenitent. Nothing can be a greater mistake. 
The Apostle Paul has given us a better rule on the subject, 
where he says, " Be pitiful, be courteous, not rendering evil 
for evil, or railing for railing, but contrariwise blessing." A 
rude and coarse address is only calculated to give an unfavor- 
able opinion both of you and your religion. 

(4.) Be sure to be very plain. Do not suffer yourself to 
cover up anv circumstance of the person's character, and his 
relations to God. Lay it all open, not for the purpose of 
offending or wounding him, but because it is necessary. Be- 
fore you can cure a wound, you must probe it to the bottom. 
Keep back none of the truth, but let it come out plainly before 
him. 

(5.) Be sure to address his conscience. In public addresses, 
ministers often get hold of the feelings only, and thus awaken 
the mind. But in private conversation you cannot do so. 
You cannot pour out the truth in an impassioned and rousing 
manner. And unless you address the conscience pointedly, 
you get no hold of the mind at all. 

(6.) Bring the great and fundamental truths to bear upon the 
person's mind. Sinners are very apt to run off upon some 
pretext or some subordinate point, especially some point of 
sectarianism. For instance, if the man is a Presbyterian, he 
will try to turn the conversation on the points of difference 
between Presbyterians and Methodists. Or he will fall foul 
of old school divinity. Do not yield to him, or talk with him 
on any such point ; it will do more hurt than good. Tell him 
the present business is to save his soul, and not to settle con- 
troverted questions in theology. Hold him to the great fun- 
damental points, by which he must be saved or lost. 

(7.) Be very patient. If he has a real difficulty in his mind, 
be very patient till you find out what it is, and then clear it 
up. If what he alleges is a mere cavil, make him see that it 
is a cavil. Do not try to answer it by argument, but show 
him that he is not sincere in advancing it. It is not worth 
while to spend your time in arguing against a cavil, but make 
him feel that he is committing sin to plead it, and thus enlist 
his conscience on your side. 

(8.) Be careful to guard your own spirit. There are many 
7* 



154 TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 

people wlio have not good temper enough to converse with 
those who are much opposed to religion. And such a person 
wants no better triumph than to see you angry. He will go 
away exulting because he has made one of these saints mad. 

(9.) If the sinner is inclined to intrench himself against 
God, be careful not to take his part in anything. If he says he 
cannot do his duty, do not take sides with him, or say any- 
thing to countenance his falsehood. Do not tell him he can- 
not, or help him maintain himself in the controversy against 
his Maker. Sometimes a careless sinner will go to finding 
fault with Christians. Do not take his part or side with him 
against Christians. Just tell him he has not got their sins to 
answer for, and he had better see to his own concerns. If 
you fall in with him, he feels that he has you on his side. 
Show him, that it is a censorious and wicked spirit that 
prompts him to make these remarks, and not a regard for 
the honor of religion or the laws of Jesus Christ. 

(10.) Bring up the individual's particular sins. Talking in 
general terms against sin will produce no results. You must 
make a man feel that you mean him. A minister who cannot 
make his hearers feel that he means them, cannot expect to 
accomplish much. Some people are very careful to avoid 
mentioning the particular sins of which they know the indi- 
vidual to be guilty, for fear of hurting his feelings. This is 
wrong. If you know his history, bring up his particular sins, 
kindly but plainly, not to give offence, but to awaken con- 
science, and give full force to the truth. 

(11.) It is generally best to be short, and not spin out what 
we have to say. Get the attention as soon as you can to the 
very point, say a few things and press them home, and bring 
the matter to an issue. If possible, get them to repent and 
give themselves to Christ at the time. This is the proper 
issue. Carefully avoid making an impression that you do not 
expect them to repent NOW. 

(12.) If possible, when you converse with sinners, be sure 
to pray with them. If you converse with them, and leave 
them without praying, you leave your work undone. 

II. The manner of dealing with awakened sinners. 

1. You should be careful to distinguish between an 
awakened sinner, and one who is under conviction. When 
you find a person who feels a little on the subject of religion, 
do not take it for granted that he is convicted of sin, and thus 
omit to use means to show him his sin. Persons are often 
awakened by some providential circumstance, as sickness, a 
thunderstorm, pestilence, death in the family, disappoint- 



TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 155 

ment, or tlie like, or by the Spirit of God, so that their ears 
are open, and they are ready to hear on the subject of re- 
ligion with attention and seriousness, and some feeling. If 
you find a person awakened, no matter by what means, lose 
no time in pouring light upon his mind. Do not be afraid, but 
show him the breadth of the Divine law, and the exceeding 
strictness of its precepts. Make him see how it condemns 
his thoughts and life. Search out his heart, find what is 
there, and bring it up before his mind, as far as you can. If 
possible, melt him down on the spot. When once you have 
got a sinner's attention, very often his conviction and con- 
version is the work of a few moments. You can sometimes 
do more in five minutes, than in years or a whole life while 
he is careless or indifferent. 

I have been amazed at the conduct of those cruel parents, 
and other heads of families, who will let an awakened sinner 
be in their families for days and weeks, and not say a word 
to him on the subject. Why, they say, if the Spirit of God 
has begun a work in him, he will certainly carry it on ! Per- 
haps the person is anxious to converse, and puts himself in 
the way of Christians, as often as possible, expecting they 
will converse with him, and they do not say a word. Amaz- 
ing ! Such a person ought to be looked out immediately, as 
soon as he is awakened, and let a blaze of light be poured into 
his mind without delay. Whenever you have reason to believe 
that a person within your reach is awakened, do not sleep 
till you have poured in the light upon his mind, and tried to 
bring him to immediate repentance. Then is the time to 
press the subject with effect. If that favorable moment is 
lost, it can never be recovered. 

I have often seen Christians in revivals, who were con- 
stantly on the look-out to see if any persons appeared to be 
awakened. And as soon as they saw any one begin to mani- 
fest feeling under preaching, they would mark him, and as 
soon as the meeting was out, invite him to a room and con- 
verse and pray with him, and if possible not leave him till he 
was converted. A remarkable case of this kind occurred in 
a town at the West. A merchant cam§ to the place from a 
distance to buy goods. It was a time of powerful revival, 
but he was determined to keep out of its influence, and so he 
would not go to any meeting at all. At length he found 
everybody so much engaged in religion that it met him at 
every turn, and he got vexed, and swore he would go home. 
There was so much religion there, he said, he could not do 
any business, and he would not stay. Accordingly he took 



156 TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 

his seat for the stage, which was to leave at four o'clock the 
next morning. As he spoke of going away, a gentleman be- 
longing to the house, who was one of the young converts, 
asked him if he would not go to a meeting once before he 
left town. He finally consented, and went to the meeting. 
The sermon took hold of his mind, but not with sufficient 
power to bring him into the kingdom. He returned to his 
lodgings, and called the landlord to pay his bill. The land- 
lord, who had himself recently experienced religion, saw that 
he was agitated. He accordingly spoke to him on the subject 
of religion, and the man burst into tears. The landlord im- 
mediately called in three or four young converts, and they 
prayed and exhorted him, and at four o'clock in the morning, 
when the stage called, he went on his way rejoicing in God I 
When he got home, he called his family together, confessed 
to them his past sins, and avowed his determination to live 
differently, and prayed with them for the first time. It was 
so unexpected that it was soon noised abroad, people began 
to inquire, and a revival broke out in the place. Now, sup- 
pose these Christians had done as some do, been careless, 
and let the man go off, slightly impressed ? It is not prob- 
able he ever could have been saved. Such opportunities are 
often lost for ever, when once the favorable moment is passed. 

m. The manner of dealing with convicted sinners. 

By a convicted sinner I mean one who feels himself con- 
demned by the law of God, as a guilty sinner. He has so 
much instruction as to understand something of the extent 
of God's law, and he sees and feels his guilty state, and 
knows what his remedy is. To deal with these often requires 
great wisdom. There are some most trying cases occur, 
when it is extremely difficult to know what to do with them. 

1. Whe& a person is convicted and not converted, but re- 
mains in an anxious state, there is generally some specific 
reason for it. In &uch cases, it does no good to exhort him 
to repent, or to explain the law to him. He knows all that, 
he understands all these general points. But still he does 
not repent. Now there must be some particular difficulty to 
overcome. You may preach &nd pray, and exhort till dooms- 
day, and not gain anything. 

You must then set yourself to inquire what is that parti- 
cular difficulty. A physician, when ha is called to a patient, 
and finds him sick with a particular disease, first administers 
the general remedies that are applicable to that disease. If 
they produce no effect, and the disease still continues, he 
must examine the case, and learn the constitution of the in- 



TO© WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 157 

dividual, and his habits, diet, manner of living, etc., and see 
what the matter is that the medicine does not take effect. 
So it is with the case of a sinner convicted but not converted. 
If your ordinary instructions and exhortations fail, there 
must be a difficulty. The particular difficulty is often known 
to the individual himself, though he keeps it concealed. 
Sometimes it is something that has escaped even his own 
observation. 

(1.) Sometimes the individual has some idol, something 
which he loves more than God, which prevents him from giv- 
ing himself up. You must search out and see what it is that 
he will not give up. Perhaps it is wealth, perhaps some 
-earthly friend, perhaps gay dress, or gay company, or some 
favorite amusement. At any rate there is something on 
which his heart is so set that he will not yield to God. 

(2.) Perhaps he has done an injury to some individual, 
that calls for redress, and he is unvvilling to confess it or to 
make a just recompense. Now, until he will confess and for- 
sake this sin, he can find no mercy. If he has injured the 
person in property, or character, or has abused him, he must 
make it up. If you can find it out, tell him plainly and 
frankly, that there is no hope for him till he is willing to 
confess it, and to do what is right. 

(3.) Sometimes there is some particular sin, which he will 
not forsake. He pretends it is only a small one, or tries to 
persuade himself it is no sin. No matter how small it is, he 
can never get into the kingdom of God till he gives it up. 
Sometimes an individual has seen it to be a sin to use tobacco, 
and he never can find true peace till he gives it up. Perhaps 
he is looking upon it as a small sin. 

But God knows nothing about small sins in such a case. 
What is the sin ? Why it is injuring your health, setting a 
bad example, and taking God's money, which you are bound 
to employ in his service, and spending it for tobacco. What 
would a merchant say, if he found one of his clerks in the 
habit of going to the money drawer, and taking money 
enough to keep him in cigars ? Would he call it a small 
offence ? No, he would say he deserved to be sent to the 
State prison. I mention this particular sin, because I have 
found it to be one of the things to which men who are con- 
victed will hold on when they know it is wrong, and then 
wonder why they do not find peace. 

(4.) See if there* is not some work of remuneration, which 
he is bound to do. Perhaps he has defrauded somebody in 
trade, or taken some unfair advantage, contrary to the golden 



158 TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 

rule of doing as you would be done by, and is unwilling to 
make satisfaction. This is a very common sin among mer- 
chants and men of business. I have known many melancholy 
instances, where men have grieved away the Spirit of God, 
or else have been driven well nigh to absolute despair because 
they were unwilling to give satisfaction where they had done 
such things. Now it is plain that such persons never can 
have forgiveness until they do it. 

(5.) They may have intrenched themselves somewhere, and 
fortified their minds in regard to some particular point, which 
they are determined not to yield. For instance, they may 
have taken strong ground that they will not do a particular 
thing. I knew a man who was determined not to go into a 
certain grove to pray. Several other persons during the re- 
vival had gone into the grove, and there, by prayer and medi- 
tation, given themselves to God. His own clerk had been 
converted there. The lawyer himself was awakened, but he 
was determined that he would not go into the grove. He had 
powerful convictions, and. went on for weeks in this way, with 
no relief. He tried to make God believe that it was not pride 
that kept him from Christ ; and so, when he was going home 
from meeting, he would kneel down in the street and pray. 
And not only that, but he would look round for a mud-puddle 
in the street, in which he might kneel, to show that he was 
not proud. He once prayed all night in his parlor, but he 
would not go into the grove. His distress was so great, and 
he was so angry with God, that he was strongly tempted to 
make way with himself, and actually threw away his knife for 
fear he should cut his throat. At length he concluded he 
would go into the grove and pray, and as soon as he got there 
he was converted, and went and poured out his full heart to 
God. 

So individuals are sometimes intrenched in a determination 
that they will not go to a particular meeting, perhaps the in- 
quiry meeting, or some prayer meeting, or they will not have 
a certain person pray with them, or they will not take a par- 
ticular seat, such as the anxious seat. They say that they can 
be converted just as well without yielding this point, for relig- 
ion does not consist in this, going to a particular meeting, or 
taking a particular attitude in prayer, or a particular seat. 
This is true, but by taking this ground they make it the mate- 
rial point. And so long as they are intrenched there, and 
determined to bring God to their terms, they never can be 
converted. Sinners will often yield any thing else, and do 
any thing in the world, but yield the point upon which they 



TO WIN SOULS KEQUIRES WISDOM. 159 

have committed themselves, and taken a stand against God. 
They cannot be humbled until they yield this point, whatever 
it is. And if without yielding -it they get a hope, it will be a 
false hope. 

(6.) Perhaps he has a prejudice against some one, a mem- 
ber ofrthe church perhaps, on account of some faithful dealing 
with his soul, or something in his business that he did not 
like, and he hangs on this and will never be converted till he 
gives it up. Whatever it be, you should search it out and tell 
him the truth plainly and faithfully. 

(7.) He may feel ill will towards some one, or be angry, 
and cherish strong feelings of resentment, which prevent him 
from obtaining mercy from God. " And when ye stand pray- 
ing, forgive, if ye have aught against any : that your Father 
also which is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses. 
But, if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in 
heaven forgive your trespasses." 

(8.) Perhaps he entertains some errors in doctrine, or some 
wrong notions respecting the thing to be done, or the way of 
doing it, which may be keeping him out of the kingdom. Per- 
haps he is waiting for God. He is convinced that he deserves 
to go to hell, and that unless he is converted he must go there, 
but he is waiting for God to do something to him before he 
submits. He is in fact waiting for God to do for him what he 
has required the sinner to do. 

He may be waiting for more conviction. People often do 
not know what conviction is, and think they are not under 
convictiou, when in fact they are under powerful conviction. 
They often think nothing is conviction unless they have great 
fears of hell. But the fact is, individuals often have strong 
convictions, who have very little fear of hell. Show them 
what is the truth, and let them see they have no need to wait. 

Perhaps he may be waiting for certain feelings, which some- 
body else has had before he obtained mercy. This is very 
common in revivals, where some one of the first converts has 
told of remarkable experiences. Others who are awakened 
are very apt to think they must wait for just such feelings. I 
knew a young man thus awakened ; his companion had been 
converted in a remarkable way, and this one was waiting for 
just such feelings. He said he was using the means, and 
praying for them, but finally found that he was a Christian, 
although he had not been through the course of feeling he 
expected. 

Sinners often lay out a plan of the way they expect to feel, 
and how they expect to be converted, and in fact lay out the 



160 TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 

work for God, determined that they will go in that path or 
not at all. Tell them this is all wrong, they must not lay out 
any such path beforehand, but let God lead them as he sees 
to be best. God always leads the blind by a way they know 
not. There never was a sinner brought into the kingdom 
through such a course of feeling as he expected. Very often 
they are amazed to find that they are in, and have had no 
such exercises as they expected. 

It is very common for persons to be waiting to be made 
subjects of prayer, or for some particular means to be used, 
or to see if they cannot make themselves better. They are 
so wicked, they say, that they can not come to Christ. They 
want to try, by humiliation, and suffering, and prayer, to fit 
themselves to come. You will have to hunt them out of all 
these refuges. It is astonishing into how many corners they 
will often run before they will go to Christ. I have known 
persons almost deranged for the want of a little correct in- 
struction. 

Sometimes such people think their sins are too great to be 
forgiven, or that they have grieved the Spirit of God away, 
when that Spirit is all the while convicting them. They pre- 
tend their sins are greater than Christ's mercies, thus actually 
insulting the Lord Jesus Christ. 

Sometimes sinners get the idea that they are given up of 
God, and that now they cannot be saved. It is often very 
difficult to beat persons off from this ground. Many of the 
most distressing cases I have ever met with have been of this 
character, where persons would insist upon it they were given 
up and nothing would change* them. 

In a place where I was laboring in a revival I went one 
day into the meeting, and before the exercises commenced I 
heard a low moaning, distressing, unearthly noise. I looked 
and saw several women gathered round the person who made 
it. They said it was a woman in despair. She had been a 
long time in that state. Her husband was a drunkard. He 
had brought her to meeting and gone himself to the tavern. 
I conversed with her and saw her state, and that it was very 
difficult to reach her case. As I was going away to commence 
the exercises she said she must go out, for she could not hear 
praying or singing. I told her she must not go, and told the 
ladies to detain her, if necessary, by force. I felt that if the 
devil had hold of her, God was stronger than the devil, and 
could deliver her. The exercises began, and she made some 
noise at first. But by and by she looked up. The subject 
was chosen with special reference to her case, and as it pro- 



TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 161 

ceeded, her attention was gained, her eyes were fixed — I never 
shall forget how she looked — her eyes and mouth open, her 
head up, and she almost rose from her seat as the truth poured 
in upon her mind. Finally, as the truth knocked away every 
foundation on which her despair had rested, she shrieked out, 
put her head down, and sat perfectly still till the meeting was 
out. I went to her, and found her perfectly calm and happy 
in God. I saw her long afterwards, and she remained so. 
Thus Providence threw her where she never expected to be, 
and compelled her to hear instruction adapted to her case. 
You may often do incalculable good by finding out precisely 
where the difficulty lies, and then bring the truth to bear right 
on that point. 

Sometimes persons will strenuously maintain that they have 
committed the unpardonable sin. When they get that idea 
into their minds, they will turn every thing you say against 
themselves. In some such cases, it is a good way to take 
them on their own ground, and reason with them in this way; 
"Suppose you have committed the unpardonable sin, what 
then ? It is reasonable that you should submit to God, and 
be sorry for your sins, and break off from them, and do all 
the good you can, even if God will not forgive you. Even if 
you go to hell, you ought to do this." Press this thought and 
turn it over until you find they understand and consent to it. 

It is common for persons in such cases to keep their eyes 
on themselves ; they will shut themselves up and keep look- 
ing at their own darkness, instead of looking away to Christ. 
Now if you can take their minds off from themselves, and get 
them to think of Christ, you may draw them away from brood- 
ing over their own present feelings, and get them to lay hold- 
on the hope set before them in the GospeL 

2. Be careful, in conversing with convicted sinners, not to 
make any compromise with them on any point where they 
have a difficulty. If you do, they will be sure to take advan- 
tage of it, and thus get a false hope. Convicted sinners often 
get into a difficulty, in regard to giving up some darling sin, 
or yielding some point where conscience and the Holy Ghost 
are at war with them. And if they come across an individual 
who will yield the point, they feel better and are happy, and 
think they are converted. The young man who came to 
Christ was of this character. He had one difficulty, and Jesus 
Christ knew just what it was. He knew he loved his money, 
and instead of compromising the matter and thus trying to 
comfort him, he just put his finger on the very place and told 
him, " Go sell all that thou hast, and give to the poor, and 



162 TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 

and come follow me." What was the effect ? Why the young 
man went away sorrowful. Very likely, if Christ had told 
him to do any thing else, he would have felt relieved, and 
would have got a hope ; would have professed himself a dis- 
ciple, joined the church, and gone to hell. 

People are often amazingly anxious to make a compromise. 
They will ask such questions as this, Whether you do not 
think a person may be a Christian and yet do such and such 
things ; or if he may not be a Christian and not do such and 
such things? Now, do not yield an inch to any such ques- 
tions. These questions themselves may often show you the 
very point that is laboring in their minds. They will show 
you that it is pride, or love of the world, or something of the 
kind, which prevents their becoming Christians. 

Be careful to make thorough work on this point, the love 
of the world. I believe there have been more false hopes 
built on wrong instructions here, than in any other way. I 
once heard a Doctor of Divinity trying to persuade his hearers 
to give up the world ; and he told them " if they would only 
give it up, God would give it right back to them again. He 
is willing you should enjoy the world." Miserable ! God 
never gives back the world to the Christian, in the same 
sense that he requires a convicted sinner to give it up. He 
requires us to give up the ownership of everything to him, so 
that we shall never again for a moment consider it as our own. 
A man must not think he has a right to judge for himself 
how much of his property he shall lay out for God. One 
man thinks he may spend twenty thousand dollars a year to 
support his family ; he has a right to do it, because he has 
the means of his own. Another thinks he may lay up five 
hundred thousand dollars. One man said the other day, that 
he had promised he never would give any of his property to 
educate young men for the ministry. When he is applied to, 
he just answers, " I have said I never will give to any such 
object, and I never will." Man ! did Jesus Christ ever tell 
you to do so with his money ? Has he laid down any such 
rule ? Kemember it is his money you are talking about, and 
if he wants it to educate ministers, you withhold it at your 
peril. That man has yet to learn the first principle of re- 
ligion, that he is not his own, and that the money which he 
possesses is Jesus Christ's. 

Here is the great reason why the church is so full of false 
hopes. Men have been left to suppose they could be Chris- 
tians while holding on to their money. And this has served 
as a clog to every enterprise. It is an undoubted fact that 



TO WIX SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 163 

the church has funds enough to supply the world with Bibles, 
and tracts, and missionaries, immediately. But the truth is, 
that professors of religion do not believe that the " earth is 
the Lord's, and the fullness thereof." Every man supposes 
he has a right to decide what appropriation he shall make of 
his own money. And they have no idea that Jesus Christ 
shall dictate to them on the subject. 

Be sure to deal thoroughly on this point. The church is 
•now filled up with hypocrites, because they were never made 
to give up the world They never were made to see that un- 
less they made an entire consecration of all to Christ, all 
their time, all then talents, all their influence, all their pos- 
sessions, they would never get to heaven. Many think they 
can be Christians, and yet dream along through life, and use 
all their time and property for themselves, only giving a little 
now and then, to save appearances, when they can do it 
with perfect convenience. But it is a sad mistake, and they 
will find it so, if they do not employ their energies for God. 
And when they die, instead of finding heaven at the end of 
the path they are pursuing, they will find hell there. 

In dealing with a convicted sinner, be sure to drive him 
away from every refuge, and not leave him an inch of ground 
to stand on, so long as he resists God. This need not take 
a long time to do. When the Spirit of God is at work striv- 
ing with a sinner, it is easy to drive him from his refuges. 
You will find the truth will be like a hammer, crushing where- 
ever it strikes. Make clean work with it, so that he shall 
give up all for God. 

Make the sinner see clearly the nature and extent of the 
Divine law, and press the main question of entire submission 
to God. Bear down on that point as soon as you have made 
him clearly understand what you aim at, and do not turn off 
upon anything else. 

Be careful in illustrating the subject, not to mislead the 
mind so as to leave the impression that a selfish submission 
will answer, or a selfish acceptance of the atonement, or a 
selfish giving up to Christ and receiving him, as if a man 
was making a good bargain, giving up his sins and receiving 
salvation in exchange. This is mere barter, and not submis- 
sion to God. Leave no ground in your explanations or illus- 
trations, for such a view of the matter. Man's selfish heart 
will eagerly seize such a view of religion, if it be presented, 
and very likely close in with it, and thus get a false hope. 

Another time I shall call your attention to certain things 
that are to be avoided in dealing with sinners. 



164 TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 



REMARKS. 



1. Make it an object of constant study and of daily reflection 
and prayer, to learn how to deal with sinners, so as to pro- 
mote their conversion. It is the great business on earth of 
every Christian, to save souls. People often complain that 
they do not know how to take hold of this matter. Why, the 
reason is plain enough ; they have never studied it. They t 
never took the proper pains to qualify themselves for the 
work of saving souls. If people made it no more a matter 
of attention and thought to qualify themselves for their 
worldly business, than they do to save souls, how do you 
think they would succeed ? Now, if you are thus neglecting 
the main business of life, what are you living for ? If you 
do not make it a matter of study, how you may most success- 
fully act in building up the kingdom of Christ, you are act- 
ing a very wicked and absurd part as a Christian. 

2. Many professors of religion do more hurt than good, when 
they attempt to talk to impenitent sinners. They have so 
little knowledge and skill, that their remarks rather divert 
attention than increase it. 

3. Be careful to find the point ichere the Spirit of God is 
pressing a shiner, and press the same point in all your re- 
marks. If you divert his attention from that point, you will 
be in great danger of destroying his convictions. Take pains 
to learn the state of his mind, what he is thinking of, how he 
feels, and what he feels most deeply upon, and then press 
that thoroughly, and do not divert his mind by talking about 
anything else. Do not fear to press that point, for fear of 
driving him to distraction. Some people fear to press a point 
to which the mind is tremblingly alive, lest they should injure 
the mind, notwithstanding the Spirit of God is evidently de- 
bating that point with the sinner. This is an attempt to be 
wiser than God. You should clear up the point, throw the 
light of truth all around it, and bring the soul to yield, and 
then the mind is at rest. 

4. Great evils have arisen, and many false hopes have been 
created by not discriminating between an awakened and a con- 
victed sinner. For the want of this, persons who are only 
awakened are immediately pressed to submit ; "you must re- 
pent/ 5 " submit to God," when they are not in fact convinced 
of their guilt, nor instructed so far as even to know what 
submission means. This is one way in which revivals have 
been greatly injured by indiscriminate exhortations to repent, 
unaccompanied with proper instruction. 



TO WIN SOULS REQUIRES WISDOM. 165 

5. Anxious sinners are to be regarded as being in a very 
solemn and critical state. They have in fact come to a turning 
point. It is a time when their destiny is likely to be settled 
for ever. The Spirit of God will not strive always. Chris- 
tians ought to feel deeply for them. In many respects their 
circumstances are more solemn than the judgment day. Here 
then destiny is settled. The judgment day reveals it. And 
the particular time when it is done is when the Spirit is sti*iv- 
ing with tliem. Christians should remember their awful re- 
sponsibility at such times. The physician, if he knows any- 
thing of his duty, sometimes feels himself under a very solemn 
responsibility. His patient is in a critical state, where a little 
error will destroy life, and he hangs quivering between life 
and death. If such responsibility is felt in relation to the 
body, what awful responsibility should be felt in relation to the 
soul, when it is seen to hang trembling on a point, and its 
destiny is now to be decided, One false impression, one in- 
discreet remark, one sentence misunderstood, a slight diver- 
sion of mind may wear him the wrong way, and his soul is 
lost. Never was an angel employed in a more solemn work 
than that of dealing with sinners who are under conviction. 
How solemnly and carefully then should Christians walk, 
how wisely and skillfully work, if they do not mean to be the 
means of damning a soul ! 

Penally. — If there is a sinner in this house, let me say to 
him, Abandon all your excuses. You have been told" to- 
night that they are all vain. To-night it will be told in hell, 
and told in heaven, and echoed from the ends of the uni- 
verse, what you decide to do. This very hour may seal your 
eternal destiny. Will you submit to God to-night — now ? 



LECTUKE XI. 



A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 



Text.— He that winnetti souls is wise.— Proverbs xi. 30. 

I preached last Friday evening from the same text, on the 
method of dealing with sinners by private Christians. My 
object at this time is to take up the more public means of 
grace, with particular reference to the 

DUTIES OF MINISTERS. 

As I observed in my last lecture, wisdom is the choice and 
pursuit of the best end by the most appropriate means. The 
great end for which the Christian Ministry was appointed, is 
to glorify God in the salvation of souls. In speaking on this 
subject I propose to show, 

I. That a right discharge of the duties of a minister requires 
great wisdom. 

II. That the amount of success in the discharge of his du- 
ties (other things being equal) decides the amount of wisdom 
employed by him in the exercise of his office. 

L I am to show that a right discharge of the duties of a 
minister requires great wisdom. 

1. On account of the opposition it encounters. The very end 
for which the ministry is appointed is one against which is 
arrayed the most powerful opposition of sinners themselves. 
If men were willing to receive the Gospel, and there were 
nothing needed to be done but to tell the story of redemption, 
a child might convey the news. But men are opposed to the 
Gospel. They are opposed to their own salvation, in this way. 
Then* opposition is often violent and determined. I once saw 
a maniac who had formed designs against his own life, and 
he would exercise the utmost sagacity and cunning to effect 
his purpose. He would be as artful and make his keepers 
believe he had no such design, that he had given it all up, 
and would appear as mild and sober, and at the instant the)?* < 
keeper was off his guard he would lay hands on himself. So 
sinners often exercise great cunning in evading all the efforts 
(166) 



A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 167 

that are made to save them. And to meet this dreadful cun- 
ning, and overcome it so as to save men, ministers need a 
great amount of wisdom. 

2. The particular means appointed to be employed in the 
work show the necessity of great wisdom in ministers. If 
men were converted by an act of physical omnipotence, cre- 
ating some new taste, or something like that, and if sanctifi- 
cation were nothing but the same physical omnipotence root- 
ing out the remaining roots of sin from the soul, it would not 
require so much sagacity and skill to win souls. Nor would 
there then be any meaning in the text. But the truth is that 
regeneration and sanctification are to be effected by moral 
means — by argument and not by force. There never was and 
never will be any one saved by any thing but truth as the 
means. Truth is the outward means, the outward motive, 
presented first by man and then by the Holy Spirit. Take 
into view the opposition of the sinner himself, and you see 
that nothing, after all, short of the wisdom of God and the 
moral power of the Holy Spirit, can break down this opposi- 
tion, and bring him to submit to God. Still the means are to 
be used by men, and means adapted to the end, skillfully used. 
God has provided that the work of conversion and sanctifica- 
tion shall in all cases be done by means of that kind of truth, 
applied in that connection and relation, which is fitted to pro- 
duce such a result. 

3. He has the powers of earth and hell to overcome, and 
that calls for wisdom. The devil is constantly at work, trying 
to prevent the success of ministers, laboring to divert the at- 
tention from the subject of religion, and to get the sinner 
away from God and lead him down to hell. The whole frame- 
work of society, almost, is hostile to religion. Nearly all the 
influences which surround a man from his cradle to his grave, 
in the present state of society, are calculated to defeat the de- 
sign of the ministry. Does not a minister then need great 
wisdom to conflict with the powers of darkness, and the whole 
influence of the world, in addition to the sinner's own oppo- 
sition ? 

4. The same is seen from the infinite importance of the end 
itself. T^e end of the ministry is the salvation of the soul. 
When we consider the importance of the end, and the difficul- 
ties of the work, who will not say with the apostle, " Who is 
sufficient for these things?" 

5. He must understand how to wake up the church, and 
get them out of the way of the conversion of sinners. This is 
often the most difficult part of a minister's work, and requires 



168 A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 

more wisdom and patience than any thing else. Indeed, to 
do this successfully, is a most rare qualification in the Chris- 
tian ministry. It is a point where almost all ministers fail. 
They know not how to wake up the church, and raise the tone 
of piety to a high standard, and thus clear the way for the 
work of conversion. Many ministers can preach to sinners 
very well, but gain little success, while the counteracting in- 
fluence of the church resists it all, and they have not skill 
enough to remove the difficulty. There is only here and there 
administer in the country who knows how to probe the church 
when they are in a cold, backslidden state, so as effectually to 
wake them up and keep them awake. The members of the 
church sin against such light, that when they become cold it 
is very diffieijlt to rouse them up. They have a form of piety 
which wards off the truth, while at the same time it is just 
that kind of piety which has no power nor efficiency. Such 
professors are the most difficult individuals to arouse from 
their slumbers. I do not mean that they are always more 
wicked than the impenitent. They are often employed about 
the machinery of religion, and pass for very good Christians, 
but are of no use in a revival. 

I know ministers are sometimes amazed to hear it said that 
churches are not awake. No wonder such ministers do not 
know how to wake a sleeping church. There was a young 
licentiate heard brother Foote the other day, in this city, pour- 
ing out truth, and trying to wake up the churches, and he 
knew so little about it that he thought it was abusing the 
churches. So perfectly blind was he that he really thought 
the churches in New York were all awake on the subject of 
religion. So some years ago there was a great controversy 
and opposition raised, because so much was said about the 
churches being asleep. It was all truth, yet many ministers 
knew nothing about it, and were astonished to hear such things 
said about the churches. When it has come to this, that min- 
isters do not know when the church is asleep, no wonder that 
we have no revivals. I was invited once to preach at a certain 
place. I asked the minister what was the state of the church. 
"Oh," says he, "to a man they are awake." I was delighted 
at the idea of laboring in such a church, for it was a sight I 
had never yet seen, to see every single member *awake in a 
revival. But when I got there I found the church sleepy and 
cold, and I doubt whether one of them was awake. 

,Here is the great difficulty in keeping up revivals, to keep 
the church thoroughly awake and engaged. It is one thing 
for a church to get up in their sleep and bluster about and 



A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 169 

run over each other, and a widely different thing for them to 
have their eyes open, and their senses about them, and be 
wide awake, so as to know how to find God and how to work 
for Christ. 

5. He must know how to set the church to work when they are 
awake. If a minister attempts to go to work alone, calculating 
to do it all himself, it is like attempting to roll a great stone 
up a hill alone. The church can do much to help forward a 
revival. Churches have sometimes had powerful revivals 
without any minister. But when a minis ter has a church who 
are awake, and knows how to set them to work, and how to 
sit at the helm and guide them, he may feel strong, and often- 
times may find that they do more than he does himself, in the 
conversion of sinners. 

6. In order to be successful, a minister needs great wisdom 
to know how to keep the church to the work. Often the church 
seem just like children. You set children to work, and they 
appear to be all engaged, but as soon as your back is turned 
they will stop and go to play. The great difficulty in continu- 
ing & revival lies here. And to meet it requires great wisdom. 
To know how to break them down again, when their heart 
gets lifted up because they have had such a great revival ; to 
wake them up afresh when their zeal begins to flag ; to keep 
their hearts full of zeal for the work ; these are some of the 
most difficult things in the world. Yet if a minister would 
be successful in winning souls, he must know when they first 
begin to grow proud, or to lose the spirit of prayer, and when 
to probe them and how to search them over again, how to 
keep the church in the field gathering the harvest of the Lord. 

7. He must understand the Gospel. But you will ask, Do not 
all ministers understand the Gospel? I answer, that they 
certainly do not ail understand it alike, for they do not all 
preach alike. 

8. He must know how to divide it, so as to bring forward 
the particular truths, in that order, and to make them bear 
upon those points and at such times as are calculated to pro- 
duce a given result. A minister should understand the phi- 
losophy of the human mind, so as to know how to plan and 
arrange his labors wisely. Truth, when brought to bear upon 
the mind, is in itself calculated to produce corresponding feel- 
ings. The minister must know what feelings he wishes to 
produce, and how to bring such truth to bear as is calculated 
to produce these feelings. He must know how to present 
truth calculated to humble Christians, or to make them feel 
for sinners, or to awaken sinners, or to convert them. 

8 



170 A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 

Often, when sinners are awakened, the ground is lost for 
the want of wisdom in following up the blow. Perhaps a 
rousing sermon is preached, Christians are moved, and sin- 
ners begin to feel, and the next Sabbath something will be 
brought forward that has no connection with the state of feel- 
ing in the congregation, and that is not calculated to lead the 
mind on to the exercise of repentance, faith or love. It shows 
how important it is that a minister should understand how to 
produce a given impression, at what time it may and jhould 
be done, and by what truth, and how to follow it up, till the 
sinner is broken down and brought in. 

A great many good sermons preached are all lost for the 
want of a little wisdom here. They are good sermons, and 
calculated, if well timed, to do great good ; but they have so 
little conneqtion with the actual state of feeling in the con- 
gregation, that it would be more than a miracle if they should 
produce a revival. A minister may preach in this random 
way till he has preached himself to death, and never produce 
any great results. He may convert here and there a scatter- 
ing soul ; but he will not move the mass of the congregation 
unless he knows how to follow up his impressions, to carry- 
out a plan of operations and execute it, so as to carry on the 
work when it is begun. He must not only be able to blow 
the trumpet so loud as to start the sinner from his lethargy, 
but when he is waked, he must lead him by the shortest way 
to Jesus Christ. And not as soon as sinners are roused by 
a sermon, immediately begin to preach about some remote 
subject that has no tendency to carry on the work. 

10. To reach different classes of sinners successfully requires 
great wisdom on the part of a minister. For instance, a ser- 
mon on a particular subject may start a particular class of 
persons among his hearers. Perhaps they will begin to look 
serious, or perhaps talk about it, or perhaps they will begin 
to cavil about it. Now, if the minister is wise, he will know 
how to observe those indications, and to follow right on with 
sermons adapted to this class, until he leads them into the 
kingdom of God. Then let him go back and take another 
class, find out where they are hid, break down their refuges, 
and follow them up, till he leads them into the kingdom of 
God. He should thus beat about every bush where sinners 
hide themselves, as the voice of God followed Adam in the 
garden — "Adam, where art thou?" till one class of hearers 
after another are brought in, and so the whole community 
converted. Now a minister must be very wise to do this. It 
never will be done so till a minister sets himself to hunt out 



X WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 171 

and bring in every class of sinners in his congregation, the 
old and young, male and female, rich and poor. 

11. A minister needs great wisdom to get sinners away 
from their present refuges of lies, without forming new hiding 
places for them. I once sat under the ministry of a man who 
had contracted a. great alarm about heresies, and was con- 
stantly employed in confuting them. And he used to bring 
up many such heresies as his people never heard of. He got 
his ideas chiefly from books, and mingled very little among 
the people to know what they thought. And the result of 
his labors often was, that the people would be taken with the 
heresy, more than with the argument against it. The novelty 
of- the error attracted their attention so much that they 
forgot the answer. And in that way he gave many of his 
people new objections against religion, such as they never 
thought of before. If a man does not mingle enough with 
mankind to know how people think now-a-days he cannot ex- 
pect to be wise to meet their objections and difficulties. 

I have heard a great deal of preaching against Universal- 
ists, that did more hurt than good, because the preachers 
did not understand how Universalists of the present day 
reason. They have never mingled with Universalists, and 
know not what they believe and how they argue, now, but 
have got all they know of Universahsm from books that were 
written long ago, and are now out of date among Universal- 
ists themselves. And the consequence is that when they at- 
tempt to preach against Universahsm they oppose a man of 
straw, and not Universalist sentiments as they are now found 
in the community. And people either laugh at them, or say 
it is all lies, for they know Universalists do not hold such 
sentiments as are ascribed to them by the preacher. 

When ministers undertake to oppose a present heresy, they 
ought to know what it is at present. For instance, almost 
all those who write and preach against Universahsm think 
they are called upon to oppose the idea that God is all mercy. 
They suppose Universalists hold the doctrine that God is all 
mercy, and that when they have refuted this doctrine, they have 
got Universalists down. But this is not true. They clo not 
. hold such doctrine. They deny it altogether. They reject 
the idea of mercy in the salvation of men, for they hold that 
every man is punished in full according to his just deserts. 
Of what use is it, then, to argue against Universalists, that 
God is a God of justice and not a God all mercy, when they 
hold to the justice of God alone as the ground of salvation, 
and do not admit the idea of mercy at all % In like manner, 



172 A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 

I have heard men preach against the idea that men are saved 
in their sins, and they supposed they were preaching down 
XJniversalist doctrine. Universalists believe no such thing. 
They believe that all men will be made holy and saved in that 
way. This shows the importance of knowing what people 
actually hold, before you try to reason tfyeni out of their 
errors. It is of no use to misrepresent a man's doctrines to 
his face, and then try to reason him out of them. You must 
state his doctrine just as he holds it, and state his arguments 
fairly. Otherwise, if you state them wrong, you either make 
him angry, or he laughs in his sleeve at the advantage you 
give him. He will say, That man cannot argue with me on 
fair grounds ; he has to misrepresent our doctrines in order 
to confute me. Great hurt is done in this way. Ministers 
do not intend to misrepresent their opponents ; but the effect 
of it is, that the poor miserable creatures who hold these 
errors go to hell because ministers do not take care to inform 
themselves what are their real errors. Errors are never torn 
away by such a process. I mention these cases to show how 
much wisdom a minister must have to meet the cases that 
occur. He must be acquainted with the real views of men 
in order to meet them, and do away their errors and mis- 
takes. 

12. Ministers ought to know what measures are best calcu- 
lated to aid in accomplishing the great end of their office, 
the salvation of souls. Some measures are plainly necessary. 
By measures, I mean what things should be done to get the 
attention of the people and bring them to listen to the truth. 
Building houses for worship, and visiting from house to 
house, etc., are all " measures," the object of which is to get 
the attention of people to the Gospel. Much wisdom is 
requisite to devise and carry forward all the various measures 
that are adapted to favor the success of the Gospel. 

What do the politicians do ? They get up meetings ; circu- 
late handbills and pamphlets ; blaze away in the newspapers ; 
send their ships about the streets on wheels with flags and 
sailors ; send coaches all over town, with handbills, to bring 
people up to the polls — all to gain attention to their cause 
and elect their candidate. All these are their " measures," 
and for their end they are wisely calculated. The object is to 
get up an excitement, and bring the people out. They know 
that unless there can be an excitement it is in vain to push 
then* end. I do not mean to say that their measures are 
pious, or right, but only that they are wise, in the sense that 
they are the appropriate application of means to the end. 



A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 173 

The object of tlie ministry is to get all the people to feel 
that the devil has no right to rifle this world, but that they 
ought all to give themselves to God, and vote in the Lord 
Jesus Christ as the governor of the universe. Now what 
shall be done ? What measures shall we take ? Says one, 
" Be sure and have nothing that is new." Strange ! The 
object of our measures is to gain attention, and you must have 
something new. As sure as the effect of a measure becomes 
stereotyped, it ceases to gain attention, and then you must 
try something new. You need not make innovations in 
everything. But whenever the state of things is such that 
anything more is needed, it must be something new, other- 
wise it will fail. A minister should never introduce innova- 
tions that are not called for. If he does they will embarrass 
him. He cannot alter the Gospel ; that remains the same. 
But new measures are necessary, from time to time, to 
awaken attention and bring the Gospel to bear upon the pub- 
lic mind. And then a minister ought to know how to intro- 
duce new things, so as to create the least possible resistance 
or reaction. Mankind are fond of form in religion. They 
love to have their religious duties stereotyped, so as to leave 
them at ease ; and they are therefore inclined to resist any 
new movement designed to rouse them up to action and 
feeling. Hence it is all-important to introduce new things 
wisely, so as not to give needless occasion or apology for 
resistance. 

13. Not a little wisdom is sometimes needed by a minister 
to know tchen to put a stop to ?iew measures. When a measure 
has novelty enough to secure attention to the truth, ordinarily 
no ofcher new measure should be introduced. You have se- 
cured the great object of novelty. Anything more will be in 
danger of diverting the public mind away from the great 
object, and fixing it on the measures themselves. And then, 
if you introduce novelties when they are not called for, you 
will go over so large a field, that by and by when you really 
want something new, you will have nothing else to introduce, 
without doing something that will give too great a shock to 
the public mind. The Bible has laid down no specific course 
of measures to promote revivals of religion, but has left it 
to ministers to adopt such as are wisely calculated to secure 
the end. And the more sparing we are of our new things, 
the longer we can use them, to keep public attention awake 
to the great subject ox religion. By a wise course this may 
undoubtedly be done for a long series of years, until our pre- 
sent measures will by and by have sufficient novelty in them 



174 A WISE MINISTER* WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 

again to attract and "fix public attention. And so we shall 
never want for something Hew. 

13. A minister, to win souls, must know how to deal with 
careless, with awakened, and with anxious sinners, so as to 
lead them right to Christ in the shortest and most direct 
way. It is amazing to see how many ministers there are who 
do not know how to deal with sinners, or what to say to them 
in their various states of mind. A good woman in Albany 
told me, that when she was under concern she went to her 
minister and asked him to tell her what she must do to get 
relief. And he said God had not given him much experience 
on the subject, and advised her to go to such a deacon, who 
perhaps could tell her what to do. The truth was, he did not 
know what to say to a sinner under conviction, although 
there was nothing peculiar in her case. Now if you think 
this minister a rare case, you are quite deceived. There are 
many ministers who do not know what to say to sinners. 

A minister once appointed an anxious meeting, and went 
to attend it, and instead of going round to the individuals, 
he began to ask them the catechism, " Wherein doth Christ 
execute the office of a priest V About as much in point to 
a great many of their minds as anything else. 

I know a minister who held an anxious meeting, and went 
to attend it with a written discourse which he had prepared 
for the occasion. Just as wise as it would be if a physician, 
going out to visit his patients, should sit down at leisure and 
write all the prescriptions before he had seen them. A min- 
ister needs to know the state of mind of the individuals, 
before he can know what truth will be proper and useful to 
administer. I say these things, not because I love to do it, 
but because truth, and the object before me, requires them 
to be said. And such instances as I have mentioned are by 
no means rare. 

A minister should know how to apply truth to all the situa- 
tions in which he may find dying sinners going down to hell. 
He should know how to preach, how to pray, how to con- 
duct prayer-meetings, and how to use all the means for bring- 
ing the truth of God to bear upon the kingdom of darkness. 
Does not this require wisdom ? And who is sufficient for 
these things? 

II. The amount of a minister's success in winning souls 
{other things being equal) invariably decides the amount of wis- 
dom he has exercised in the discharge of his office. 

1. This is plainly asserted in the text. " He that winneth 
souls is wise." That is, if a man wins souls, he does skill- 



A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 175 

fully adapt means to the end, which is, to exercise wisdom. 
He is the more wise, by how much the greater is the number 
of sinners that he saves. A blockhead may, indeed, now 
and then stumble on such truth or such a manner of exhibit- 
ing it, as to save a soul. It would be a wonder indeed if 
any minister did not sometimes have something in his ser- 
mons that would meet the case of some individual. But the 
amount of wisdom is to be decided, " other things being 
equal," by the number of cases in which he is successful in 
converting sinners. 

Take the case of a physician. The greatest quack in New 
York may now and then stumble upon a remarkable cure, 
and so get his name up with the ignorant. But sober and 
judicious people judge of the skill of a physician by the 
uniformity of his success in overcoming disease, the variety of 
diseases he can manage, and the number of cases in which he 
is successful in saving his patients. The most skillful saves 
the most. This is common sense. It is truth. And it is 
just as true "in regard to success in saving souls, and true in 
just the same sense. 

2. This principle is not only asserted in the text, but it is 
a matter of fad, a historical truth, that " He that whine th souls 
is wise." He has actually employed means adapted to the 
end, in such a way as to secure the end. 

3. Success in saving souls is evidence that a man under- 
stands the Gospel, and understands human nature, that he 
knows how to adapt means to his end, that he has common 
sense, and that he has that kind of tact, that practical discern- 
ment, to knGw how to get at people. And if his success is 
extensive, it shows that he knows how to deal with a great 
variety of characters, in a great variety of circumstances, 
who are yet all the enemies of God, and to bring them to 
Christ. To do this requires great wisdom. And the minister 
who does it shows that he is wise. 

4. Success in winning souls shows that a minister not only 
knows how to labor wisely for that end, but also that he knows 
where his dependence is. Tou know that fears are often ex- 
pressed respecting those ministers who are aiming most 
directly and earnestly at the conversion of sinners. People 
say, " Why, this man is going to work in his own strength ; 
one would imagine he thinks he can convert souls himself." 
How often has the event showed that the man knows what 
he is about, very well, and knows where his strength is too. 
He went to work to convert sinners so earnestly, just as if he 
could do it all himself ; but that was the very way he should 



116 A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 

do. He ought to reason with sinners, and plead with them, 
as faithfully and fully as if he did not expect any interposi- 
tion of the Spirit of God, or as if he knew there was no Holy 
Ghost. But whenever a man does this successfully, it shows 
that, after all, he knows he must depend on the Spirit of God 
alone for success. 

Objection. — There are many who feel an objection against 
this subject, arising out of the view they have taken of the 
ministry of Jesus Christ. They ask us, "What will you say 
about the ministry of Jesus Christ, was not he wise V I 
answer, Yes, infinitely wise. But in regard to his alleged 
want of success in the conversion of sinners, you will ob- 
serve the following things : 

(1.) That his ministry was vastly more successful than is 
generally supposed. We read in one of the sacred writers, 
that after his resurrection and before his ascension " he was 
seen by about five hundred brethren at once." If so many 
as five hundred brethern were found assembled together at 
one place, we see there must have been a vast number of 
them scattered over the country. 

(2.) Another circumstance to be observed is, that his pub- 
lic ministry was very short, less than three years. 

(3.) Consider the peculiar design of his ministry. His 
main object was to make atonement for the sins of the world. 
It was not aimed so much at promoting revivals. The " dis- 
pensation of the Spirit" was not yet given. He did not 
preach the Gospel so fully as his apostles did afterwards. The 
prejudices of the people were so fixed and violent that they 
would not bear it. That he did not, is plain from the fact 
that even his apostles, who were constantly with him, did not 
understand the atonement. They did not get the idea that 
he was going to die, and consequently, when they heard he 
was actually dead, they were driven to despair, and thought 
the thing was all gone by, and their hopes blown to the winds. 
The fact was, that he had another object in view, to which 
every thing else was made to yield, and the perverted state 
of the public mind, and the obstinate prejudices prevailing, 
showed why results were not seen any more in the conver- 
sion of sinners. The state of public opinion was such, that 
they finally murdered him for what he did preach. 

Many ministers who have little or no success, are hiding 
themselves behind the ministry of Jesus Christ, as if he was 
an unsuccessful preacher. Whereas, in fact, he was eminent- 
ly successful, considering the circumstances in which he labor- 
ed. This is the last place in all the world where a minister 
who has no success should think of hiding himself. 



A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 177 



REMAKK8. 

1. A minister may be very learned and not wise. There are 
many ministers possessed of great learning ; they understand 
ail the sciences, physical, moral, and theological ; they may 
know the dead languages, and possess all learning, and yet 
not be wise, in relation to the great end about which they are 
chiefly employed. Facts clearly demonstrate this. " He that 
vdnneth souls is wise." 

2. An unsuccessful minister may be pious as well as learned, 
and yet not wise. It is unfair to infer because a minister is 
unsuccessful, that therefore he is a hypocrite. There may be 
something defective in his education, or in his mode of view- 
ing a subject, or of exhibiting it, or such a want of common 
sense, as will defeat his labors, and prevent his success in win- 
ning souls, whil^ he himself may be saved — " yet so as by 
fire. 

3. A minister may be very wise, though he is not learned. 
He may not understand the dead languages, or theology in 
its common acceptation ; and yet he may know just what a 
minister of the Gospel wants most to know, without knowing 
many other things. A learned minister and a wise minister 
are different things. Facts in the history of the church in 
all ages prove this. It is very common for churches, when 
looking out for a minister, to aim at getting a very learned 
man. Do not understand me to disparage learning. The 
more learning the better, if he is also wise in the great mat- 
ter he is employed about. If a minister knows how to win 
souls, the more learning he has the better. But if he has 
any other kind of learning, and not this, he will infallibly fail 
of the end of his ministry. 

4. Want of success in a minister (other things being equal) 
proves, (1.) either that he was never called to preach, and 
has taken it up out of his own head ; or (2.) that he was 
badly educated, and was never taught the very things he 
wants most to know ; or (3.) if he was called to preach, and 
knows how to do his duty, he is too indolent and too wicked 
to do it. 

5. Those are the best educated ministers, who win the most 
souls. Ministers are sometimes looked down upon, and 
called very ignorant, because they do not know sciences and 
languages ; although they are veiy far from being ignorant 
of the great thing for which the ministry is appointed. This 
is wrong. Learning is important, and always useful. But 
after all, a minister mav know how to win souls to Christ, 

8* 



178 A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 

without great learning, and he has the best education for a 
minister, who can win the most souls to Christ. 

6. There is evidently a great defect in the present mode of 
educating ministers. This is a SOLEMN FACT, to which 
the attention of the whole church should be distinctly called ; 
that the great mass of young ministers who are educated ac- 
complish very little. 

When young men come out from the seminaries, are they 
fit to go into a revival ? Look at a place where there has 
been a revival in progress, and a minister is wanted. Let 
them send to a theological seminary for a minister. Will he 
enter into the work, and sustain it, and carry it on ? Seldom. 
Like David with Saul's armor, he comes in with such a load 
of theological trumpery, that he knows nothing what to do. 
Leave him there for two weeks, and the revival is at an end. 
The churches know and feel, that the greatw part of these 
young men do not know how to do anything that needs to 
be done for a revival, and they are complaining that the 
young ministers are so far behind the church. You may send 
all over the United States, to theological seminaries^ and find 
but few young ministers fitted to carry forward the work. 
What a state of things ! 

There is a grand defect in educating ministers. Education 
ought to be such, as to prepare young men for the i^ecvliar 
icork to which they are destined. But instead of this, they are 
educated for any thing else. The grand mistake is this. 
They direct the mind too much to irrelevant matters, which are 
not necessary to be attended to. In their courses of study, 
they carry the mind over too wide a field, which diverts their 
attention from the main thing, and so they get cold in religion, 
and when they get through, instead of being fitted for their 
work, they are unfitted for it. Under pretence of disciplining 
the mind, they in fact scatter the attention, so that when they 
come to their work, they are awkward, and know nothing, 
how to take hold, or how to act, to win souls. This is not 
universally the case, but too often it is so. 

It is common for people to talk loudly and largely about 
an educated ministry. God forbid that I should say a word 
against an educated ministry. But what do we mean by an 
education for the ministry? Do we mean that they should 
be so educated, as to be fitted for the work ? If they are so 
educated, the more education the better. Let education be 
of the right kind, teaching a young man the things he needs 
to know, and not the very things he does not need to know. 
Let them be educated/o?' the icork. Do not let education be 



A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 179 

such, that when young men come out, after spending sis, 
eight, or ten years in study, they are not worth half as much 
as they were before they went. I have known young men 
come out after what they call " a thorough course," who were 
not lit to take charge of a prayer meeting, and who could not 
manage a prayer meeting, so as to make it profitable or in- 
teresting. An elder of a church in a neighboring city, in- 
formed me recently of a case in point. A young man, before 
he went to the seminary, had labored as a layman with them, 
conducted their prayer meetings, and had been exceedingly 
useful among them. After he had been to the seminary, they 
sent for him and desired his help ; but oh, how changed ! he 
was so completely transformed, that he made no impression ; 
the church soon began to complain that they should die un- 
der his influences, and he left, because he was not prepared 
for the work. 

It is common for those ministers who have been to the 
seminaries, and are now useful, to affirm that then 4 course of 
studies there did them little or no good, and that they had 
to unlearn what they had there learned, before they could effect 
much. I do not say this censoriously, but it is a solemn fact, 
and I must say it in love. 

Suppose you were going to make a man a surgeon in the 
navy. Instead of sending him to the medical school to learn 
surgery, would you send him to the nautical school to learn 
navigation ? In this way, you might qualify him to navigate 
a ship, but he is no surgeon. Ministers should be educated 
to know what the Bible is, and what the human mind is, and 
know how to bring one to bear on the other. They should 
be brought into contact with mind, and made familiar with 
all the aspects of society. They should have the Bible in one 
hand, and the map of the human mind in the other, and 
know how to use the truth for the salvation of mem 

7. A uv.nt of common sense often defeats the ends of the 
Christian mi ni stry. There are many good men in the minis- 
try, who have learning, and talents of a certain sort, but 
they have no common sense to win souls. 

8. TVe see one great defect in our theological schools.— 
Young men are shut up in their schools, confined to books 
and shut out from intercourse with the common people, or 
contact with the common mind. Hence they are not familiar 
with the mode in which co m mon people think. This accounts 
for the fact that some plain men, that have been brought up 
to business, and acquainted with human nature, are ten 
times better qualified to win souls than those who are edu- 



180 A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 

cated on the present principle, and are in fact ten times as 
well acquainted with the proper business of the ministry. 
These are called " uneducated men." This is a grand mis- 
take. They are not learned in science, but they are learned 
in the very things which they need to know as ministen^s. 
They are not ignorant ministers, for they know exactly how 
to reach the mind with truth. They understand the minds 
of men, and how to adapt the gospel to their case. They 
are better furnished for tJieir work, than if they had all the 
machinery of the schools. 

I wish to be understood. I do not say that I would not 
have a young man go to school. Nor would I discourage 
him from going over the field of science. The more the bet- 
ter, if together with it he learns also the things that the min- 
ister needs to know, in order to win souls — if he understands 
his Bible, and understands human nature, and knows how to 
bring the truth to bear, and how to guide and manage minds, 
and to lead them away from sin and lead them to God. 

9. The success of any measure designed to promote a re- 
vival of religion, demonstrates its wisdom with the follow- 
ing exceptions : 

(1.) A measure may be introduced for effect to produce 
excitement, and be such that when it is looked back upon 
afterwards, it will look nonsensical, and appear to have been 
a mere trick. In that case, it will react, and its introduction 
will do more hurt than good. 

(2.) Measures may be introduced, and the revival be very 
powerful, and the success be attributed to the measures, when 
in fact other things made the revival powerful, and these very 
measures may have been a hinderance. The prayers of 
Christians, and the preaching, and other things may have 
been so well calculated to carry on the work, that it has suc- 
ceded in spite of these measures. 

But when the blessing evidently follows the introduction of 
the measure itself, the proof is unanswerable, that the measure 
is wise. It is profane to say that such a measure will do 
more hurt than good. God knows about that. Bis object 
is, to do the greatest amount of good possible. And of course 
he will not add his blessing to a measure that will do more 
hurt than good. He may sometimes withhold his blessing 
from a measure that is calculated to do some good because 
it will be at the expense of a greater good. But he 
never will bless a pernicious proceeding. There is no such 
thing as deceiving God in the matter. He knows whether a 
given measure is, on the whole, wise, or not. He may bless 



A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 181 

a course of labours notwithstanding some unwise or injurious 
measures. But if he blesses the measure itself, it is rebuking 
God to pronounce it unwise. He who undertakes to do this, 
let him look to the matter. 

10. It is evident that much fault has been found with meas- 
ures, which have been pre-eminently and continually blessed 
of God for the promotion of revivals. We know it is said 
that the horrid oaths of a profane swearer have been the 
means of awakening another less hardened sinner. But this 
is a rare case. God does not usually make such a use of pro- 
fanity. But if a measure is continually or usually blessed, let 
the man who thinks he is wiser than God, call it in question. 
TAKE CARE how you find fault with God ! 

1J. Christians should pray for ministers. Brethren, if you 
felt how much ministers need wisdom to perform the duties 
of their great office with success, and how ignorant they all 
are, and how insufficient they are of themselves, to think any- 
thing as of themselves, you would pray for them a great deal 
more than you do ; that is, if you cared anything for the suc- 
cess of their labors. People often find fault with ministers, 
when they do not pray for them. Brethren, this is tempting- 
God, for you ought not to expect any better ministers, unless 
you pray for them. And you ought not to expect a blessing 
on the labors of your minister, or to have your families con- 
verted by his preaching, where you do not pray for him. And 
so for others, the waste places, and the heathen, instead of 
praying all the time, only that God would send out more 
laborers, you have need to pray that God would make min- 
isters wise to win souls, and that those he sends out may be 
properly educated, so that they shall be scribes well instructed 
in the kingdom of God. 

12. Those laymen? in the church who know how to win 
souls are to be counted wise. They should not be called 
" ignorant laymen." And those church members who do not 
know how to convert sinners, and who cannot win souls, 
should not be called wise — as Christians. They are not wise 
Christians ; only " he that winneth souls is wise." They may 
be learned in politics, in all sciences, or they may be skilled 
in the management of business, or other things, and they may 
look down on those who win souls, as nothing but plain, 
simple-hearted and ignorant men. If any of you are inclined 
to do this, and to undervalue those brethren who win souls, 
as being not so wise and cunning as you are, you deceive 
yourselves. They may not know some things which you 
know. But they know those things which a Christian is 
most concerned to know, and you do not. 



182 A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 

It may be illustrated by the case of a minister that goes to 
sea. He may be learned in science, but he knows nothing 
how to sail a ship. And he begins to ask the sailors about 
this thing and that, and what is this rope for, and the like. 
"Why," say the sailors, "these are not rojies, we have only 
one rope in a ship, these are the rigging, the man talks like a 
fool." And so this learned man becomes a laughing-stock, 
perhaps, to the sailors, because he does not know how to sail 
a ship. But if he were to tell them one half of what he 
knows about science, perhaps they would think him a con- 
juror, to know so much. So that learned students may 
understand their hie, hcec, hoc, very well, and may laugh at 
the humble Christian, and call him ignorant, although he 
may know how to win more souls than five hundred of them. 

I was once distressed and grieved at hearing a minister 
bearing down upon a young preacher, who had been con- 
verted under remarkable circumstances, and who was licensed 
to preach without pursuing a regular course of study. This 
minister, who was never, or at least very rarely, known to 
convert a soul, bore down upon the young man in a very 
lordly, censorious manner, depreciating him because he had 
not had the advantage of a liberal education, when in fact he 
was instrumental in converting more souls than any five hun- 
dred ministers like himself. 

I would say nothing to undervalue, or lead you to under- 
value a thorough education for ministers. But I do not call 
that a thorough education, which they get in our colleges and 
seminaries. It does not fit them for their work. I appeal to 
all experience, whether our young men in seminaries are 
thoroughly educated for the purpose of winning souls. Do 
they no it ? Everybody knows they do not. Look at the 
reports of the Home Missionary Society.* If I recollect right, 
in 1830, the number of conversions in connection with the 
labors of the missionaries of that society did not exceed five 
to each missionary. I believe the number has increased 
since, but is still exceedingly small to what it would have 
been had they been fitted by a right course of training for 
their work. I do not say this to reproach them, for from my 
heart I pity them, and I pity the church for being under the 
necessity of supporting ministers so trained, or none at all. 
They are the best men the Missionary Society can obtain. 
I suppose, of course, that I shall be reproached for saying 
this. But it is too true and too painful to be concealed. 
Those fathers who have the training of our young ministers 
are good men, but they are ancient men, men of another age 



A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 183 

and stamp, from what is needed in these days of excitement, 
when the church and world are rising to new thought and 
action. Those dear fathers will not, I suppose, see this ; and 
will perhaps think hard of me for saying it ; but it is the 
cause of Christ, Some of them are getting back toward 
second childhood, and ought to resign, and give place to 
younger men, who are not rendered physically incapable, by 
age, of keeping pace with the onward movements of the 
church. And here I would say, that to my own mind, it ap- 
pears evident, that unless our theological professors preach a 
good deal, mingle much with the church, and sympathize 
with her in all her movements, it is morally, if not naturally, 
impossible, that they should succeed in training young men to 
the spirit of the age. It is a shame and a sin, that theolog- 
ical professors, who preach but seldom, who are withdrawn 
from the active duties of the ministry, should sit in their 
studies and write their letters, advisory, or dictatorial, to 
ministers and churches who are in the field, and who are in 
circumstances to judge what needs to be done. The men 
who spend all or at least a portion of their time in the active 
duties of the ministry, are the only men who are able to 
judge of what is expedient or inexpedient, prudent or im- 
prudent, as to measures from time to time. It is as danger- 
ous and ridiculous for our theological professors, wha are 
withdrawn from the field of conflict, to be allowed to dictate, 
in regard to the measures and movements of the church, as 
it would be for a general to sit in his bed-chamber and at- 
tempt to order a battle.* 

Two ministers were one day conversing about another miri 
ister whose labors were greatly blessed in the conversion of 
some thousands of souls. One of them said, * That man 
ought not to preach any more ; he should stop and go to " 
a particular theological seminary which he named, " and go 
through a regular course of study." He said the man had 
" a good mind, and if he was thoroughly educated, he might 
be very useful. " The other replied, " Do you think he would 
be more useful for going to that seminary ? I challenge you 
to show by facts that any are more useful who have been 
there. No, sir, the fact is, that since this man has been in 
the ministry, he has been instrumental in converting more 
souls than all the young men who have come from that semin- 
ary in the time." This is logic ! Stop, and go to a seminary, 



This was said in 1833. 



184 A WISE MINISTER WILL BE SUCCESSFUL. 

to prepare himself for converting souls, when he is now con- 
verting more than all who come from the seminary ! 

Finally. — I wish to ask you, before I sit down, who among 
you can lay any claim to the possession of this Divine wis- 
dom ? Who among you, laymen ? "Who among you, minis- 
ters ? Can any of you ? Can I ? Are we at work, wisely, 
to win souls ? Or are we trying to make ourselves believe 
that success is no criterion of wisdom ? It is a criterion. It 
is a safe criterion for every minister to try himself by. The 
amount of his success, other things being equal, measures the 
amount of wisdom he has exercised in the discharge of his 
office. 

How few of you have ever had wisdom enough to convert 
so much as a single sinner ! 

Do not say now, " I cannot convert sinners ; how can I con- 
vert sinners ? God alone can convert sinners." Look at the 
text, " He that winneth souls is wise/' and do not think you 
can escape the sentence. It is true that God converts sinners. 
But there is a sense, too, in which ministers convert them. 
And you have something to do ; something that requires wis- 
dom ; something which, if you do it wisely, will insure the 
conversion of sinners in proportion to the wisdom employed. 
If you never have done this, it is high time to think about 
yourselves, and see whether you have wisdom enough to save 
even your own souls. 

Men — women — you are bound to be wise in winning souls. 
Perhaps already souls have perished ; perhaps a friend, or a 
child is in hell, because you have not put forth the wisdom 
which you might, in saving them. The city is going to hell. 
Yes, the world is going to hell, and must go on, till the church 
finds out what to do, to win souls. Politicians are wise. The 
children of this world are wise, they know what to do to ac- 
complish their ends, while we are prosing about, not know- 
ing what to do, or where to take hold of the- work, and sin- 
ners are going to hell 



LECTURE XIX. 

HOW TO PKEACH THE GOSPEL. 

Text.— He that winnetli souls is wise.— Proverbs xi. 30. 

One of the last remarks in my last lecture, was this, that 
the text ascribes conversion to men. Winning souls is con- 
verting men. This evening I design to show, 

I. That several passages of Scripture ascribe conversion to 
men. 

II. That this is consistent with other passages which ascribe 
conversion to God. 

ILL I propose to discuss several further particulars which 
are deemed important, in regard to the preaching of the 
Gospel, and which show that great practical wisdom is neces- 
sary to win souls to Christ. 

I. I am to show that the Bible ascribes conversion to men. 
There are many passages which represent the conversion 

of sinners as the work of men. In Daniel, xii. 3, it is said, 
" And they that be wise, shall shine as the brightness of the 
firmanent ; and they that turn many to righteousness as stars 
for ever and ever." Here the work is ascribed to men. So 
also in 1 Cor. iv. 15. " For though ye have ten thousand in- 
structors in Christ, yet have ye not many fathers : for in 
Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the Gospel." Here 
the apostle explicitly tells the Corinthians that he made them 
Christians, with the Gospel or truth which he preached. 
Again, in James, v. 19, 20, we are taught the same thing. 
" Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one con- 
vert him ; let him know that he which converteth the sinner 
from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and 
shall hide a multitude of sins." I might quote many other 
passages, equally explicit. But these are sufficient abundant- 
ly to establish the fact, that the Bible does actually ascribe 
conversion to men. 

II. I proceed to show that this is not inconsistent with 
those passages in which conversion is ascribed to God. 

And here let me remark, that to my mind it often appears 
very strange that men should ever suppose there was an in- 
consistency here, or that they should ever have overlooked 

(185) 



186 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

the plain common sense of the matter. How easy it is to see, 
that there is a sense in which God converts thein, and another 
sense in which men convert them. 

The Scriptures ascribe the conversion of a sinner to four dif- 
ferent agencies — to men, to God, to the truth, and to the sinner 
himself. The passages which ascribe it to the truth are the 
largest class. That men should ever have overlooked this dis- 
tinction, and should have regarded conversion as a work per- 
formed exclusively by God, is surprising. So it is that any diffi- 
culty should ever have been felt on the subject, or that peo- 
ple should ever have professed themselves unable to reconcile 
these several classes of passages. 

Why, the m Bible speaks on this subject, precisely as we 
speak on common subjects. There is a man who has been 
very sick. How natural it is for him to say of his physician, 
" That man saved my life." Does he mean to say that the 
physician saved his life without reference to God ? Certainly 
not, unless he is an infidel. God made the physician, and he 
made the medicine too. And it never can be shown but that 
the agency of God is just as truly concerned in making the 
medicine take effect to save life, as it is in making the truth 
take effect to save a soul. To affirm the contrary is down- 
right atheism. It is true then, that the physician saved him, 
and it is also true that God saved him. It is equally true 
that the medicine saved his life, and that he saved his own 
life by taking the medicine ; for the medicine would have done 
no good if he had not voluntarily taken it, or yielded his body 
to its power. 

In the conversion of a sinner, it is true that God gives the 
truth efficiency to turn the sinner to God. He is an active, 
voluntary, powerful agent in changing the mind. But he is 
not the only agent. The one that brings the truth to his no- 
tice is also an agent. "We are apt to speak of ministers and 
other men as only instruments in converting sinners. This is 
not exactly correct. Man is something more than an instru- 
ment. Truth is the mere unconscious instrument. But man 
is more, he is a voluntary, responsible agent in the business. 
In my printed sermon, No. 1., which some of you may have 
seen, I have illustrated this idea by the case of an individual 
standing on the banks of Niagara. 

" Suppose yourself to be standing on the banks of the Falls 
of Niagara. As you stand upon the verge of the precipice, 
you behold a man lost in deep reverie, approaching its verge 
unconscious of his danger. He approaches nearer and nearer, 
until he actually lifts his foot to take the final step that shall 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 187 

plunge him in destruction. At this moment you lift your 
warning voice above the roar of the foaming waters, and cry 
out, Stop. The voice pierces his ear, and breaks the charm 
that binds him ; he turns instantly upon his heel ; all pale and 
aghast he retires, quivering, from the verge of death. He 
reels and almost swoons with horror ; turns and walks slowly 
to the public house ; you follow him ; the manifest agitation 
in his countenance calls numbers around him ; and on your 
approach, he points to you, and says, That man saved my 
life. Here he ascribes the work to you ; and certainly there 
is a sense in which you had saved him. But, on being further 
questioned, he says, Stop ! how that word lings in my ears. 
Oh, that was to me the word of life ! Here he ascribes it to 
the ivord that aroused him, and caused him to turn. But, on 
conversing still further, he says, Had I not turned at that in- 
stant, I should have been a dead man. Here he speaks of it, 
and truly, as his own act ; but directly you hear him say, Oh 
the mercy of God ! if God had not interposed, I should have 
been lost. Now the only defect in this illustration is this : 
In the case supposed, the only interference on the part of 
God, was a providential one ; and the only sense in which the 
saving of the man's life is ascribed to him, is in a providential 
sense. But in the conversion of a sinner, there is something 
more than the providence of God employed ; for here not 
only does the providence of God so order it, that the preacher 
cries, Stop, but the Spirit of God urges the truth home upon 
him with such tremendous power as to induce him to 
turn." 

Not only does the preacher cry, Stop, but through the liv- 
ing voice of the preacher, the Spirit cries, Stop. The preacher 
cries, " Turn ye, why will ye die." The Spirit pours the ex- 
postulation home with such power, that the sinner turns. 
Now in speaking of this change, it is perfectly proper to say, 
that the Spirit turned him, just as you would say of a man, 
who had persuaded another to change his mind on the sub- 
ject of politics, that he had converted him, and brought him 
over. It is also proper to say that the truth converted him ; 
as in a case when the political sentiments of a man were 
changed by a certain argument, we should say that argument 
brought him over. So also with perfect propriety may we 
ascribe the change to the living preacher, or to him. who 
had presented the motives ; just as we should say of a law- 
yer who had prevailed in his argument with a jury ; he has 
got his case, he has converted the jury. It is also with the 
same propriety ascribed to the individual himself whose heart 



188 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

is changed ; we should say lie had changed his mind, he has 
come over, he has repented. Now it is strictly true, and true 
in the most absolute and highest sense ; the act is his own 
act, the turning is his own turning, while God by the truth 
has induced him to turn ; still it is strictly true that he has 
turned and has done it himself. Thus you see the sense in 
which it is the work of God, and also the sense in which 
it is the sinner's own work. The Spirit of God, by the 
truth, influences the sinner to change, and in this sense is the 
efficient cause of the change. But the sinner actually changes, 
and is therefore himself, in the most proper sense, the author 
of the change. There are some who, on reading their Bibles, 
fasten their eyes upon those passages that ascribe the work 
to the Spirit of God, and seem to overlook those that ascribe 
it to man, and speak of it as the sinner's own act. When 
they have quoted Scripture to prove it is the work of God, 
they seem to think they have proved that it is that in which 
man is passive, and that it can in no sense be the work of 
man. Some months since a tract was written, the title of 
which was, " Eegeneration, the effect of Divine Power." The 
writer goes on to prove that the work is wrought by the 
Spirit of God, and there stops. Now it had been just as 
true, just as philosophical, and just as scriptural, if he had said, 
that conversion was the work of man. It was easy to prove 
that it was the work of God, in the sense in which I have ex- 
plained it. The writer, therefore, tells the truth, so far as he 
goes ; but he has told only half the truth. For while there 
is a sense in which it is the work of God, as he has shown, 
there is also a sense in which it is the work of man, as we 
have just seen. The very title to this tract is a stumbling 
block. It tells the truth, but it does not tell the whole truth. 
And a tract might be written upon this proposition, that 
" Conversion or regeneration is the work of man ;" which would 
be just as true, just as scriptural, and -just as philosophical, 
as the one to which I have alluded. Thus the writer, in his 
zeal to recognise and honor God as concerned in this work, 
by leaving out the fact that a change of heart is the sinner's 
own act, has left the sinner strongly intrenched, with his 
weapons in his rebellious hands, stoutly resisting the claims 
of his Maker, and waiting passively for God to make him a 
new heart. Thus you see the consistency between the re- 
quirement of the text, and the declared fact that God is the 
author of the new heart. God commands you to make you 
a new heart, expects you to do it, and if it ever is done, you 
must do it." 

And let me tell you, sinner, if you do not do it you will go 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 189 

to hell, and to all eternity you will feel that you deserved to 
be sent there for not having done it. 

TTT. As proposed, I shall now advert to several important 
particulars growing out of this subject, as connected with 
preaching the Gospel, and which show that great practical 
wisdom is indispensable to win souls to Christ. 

And first, in regard to the jmatter of preaching. 

1. All preaching should be profiled. 

The proper end of all doctrine is practice. Anything 
brought forward as doctrine, which cannot be made use 
of as practical, is not preaching the Gospel. There is none 
of that sort of preaching in the Bible. That is all practical. 
" All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is 
profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for in- 
struction in righteousness : that the man of God may be 
perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. 3 ' A 
vast deal of preaching in the present day, as well as in 
past ages, is called doctrinal, as opposed to practical preach- 
ing. The very idea of making this distinction is a device 
of the devil. And a more abominable device Satan him- 
self never devised. You sometimes hear certain men tell 
a wonderful deal about the necessity of " indoctrinating 
the people." By which they mean something different 
from practical preaching ; teaching them certain doctrines, 
as abstract truths, without any particular reference to prac- 
tice. And I have known a minister in the midst of a revival, 
while surrounded with anxious sinners, leave off laboring 
to convert souls, for the purpose of "indoctrinating" the 
young converts, for fear somebody else should indoctrinate 
them before him. And there the revival stops ! Either 
his doctrine was not true, or it was not preached in the 
right way. To preach doctrines in an abstract way, and 
not in reference to practice, is absurd. God always brings 
in doctrine to regulate practice. To bring forward doc- 
trinal views for any other object is not only nonsense, but it 
is wicked. 

Some people are opx^osed to doctrinal preaching. If they 
have been used to hear doctrines preached in a cold, ab- 
stract way, no wonder they are opposed to it. They ought 
to be opposed to such preaching. But what can a man 
preach, who preaches no doctrine ? If he preaches no doc- 
trine, he preaches no gospel. And if he does not preach it 
in a practical way, he does not preach the Gospel. All 
preaching should be doctrinal, and all preaching should 
be practical. The very design of doctrine is to regulate 



190 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

practice. Any preaching that has not this tendency is not 
the Gospel A loose, exhortatory style of preaching may af- 
fect the passions, and may produce excitement, but will 
never sufficiently instruct the people to secure sound conver- 
sions. On the other hand, preaching doctrine in an abstract 
manner, may fill the head with notions, but will never sanctify 
the heart or life. 

2. Preaching should be direct. The Gospel should be 
preached to men, and not about them. The minister must 
address his hearers. He must preach to them about themselves, 
and not leave the impression that he is preaching to them 
about others. He will never do them any good, farther than 
he succeeds in convincing each individual that he means him. 
Many preachers seem very much afraid of making the im- 
pression that they mean anybody in particular. They are 
preaching against certain sins, not that have anything to do 
with the sinner. It is the sin, and not the sinner, that they 
are rebuking ; and they would by no means speak as if they 
supposed any of their hearers were guilty of these abominable 
practices. Now this is anything but preaching the Gospel. 
Thus did not the prophets, nor Christ, nor the apostles. Nor 
do those ministers do this, who are successful in winning 
souls to Christ. 

3. Another very important thing to be regarded in preach- 
ing is, that the minister should hunt after sinners, and 
Christians, wherever they may have intrenched themselves 
in inaction. It is not the design of preaching, to make men 
easy and quiet, but to make them ACT. It is not the design 
of calling in a physician to have him give opiates, and so 
cover up the disease and let it run on till it works death; but 
to search out the disease wherever it may be hidden, and to 
remove it. So if a professor of religion has backslidden, and 
is full of doubts and fears, it is not the minister's duty to 
quiet him in his sins, and comfort him, but to hunt him 
out of his errors and backsiidings, and show him just where 
he stands, and what it is that makes him full of doubts and 
fears. 

A minister ought to know the religious opinions of every 
sinner in his congregation. Indeed, a minister in the country is 
generally inexcusable if he does not. He has no excuse for not 
knowing the religious views of all his congregation, and of 
all that may come under his influence if he has had oppor- 
tunity to know them. How otherwise can he preach to 
them? How can he know how to bring forth things new 
and old, and adapt truth to their case ? How can he hunt 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 191 

them out unless he knows where they hide themselves ? He 
may ring changes on a few fundamental doctrines, Repent- 
ance and Faith, and Faith and Repentance, till the day of 
judgment, and never make any impression on many minds. 
Every sinner has some hiding-place, some intrenchment 
where he lingers. He is in possession of some darling LIE, 
with which he is quieting himself. Let the minister find it 
out and get it away, either in the pulpit or in private, or the 
man will go to hell in his sins, and his blood will be found in 
the minister's skirts. 

4. Another important thing to observe is, that a minister 
should dwell most on those particular points which are most 
needed. I will explain what I mean. 

Sometimes he may find a people who have been led to 
place great reliance on their own resolutions. They think 
they can consult their own convenience, and by and by they 
will repent, when they get ready, without any concern about 
the Spirit of God. Let him take up these notions, and 
show that they are entirely contrary to the Scriptures. Let 
him show that if the Spirit of God is grieved away, however 
able he may be, it is certain he never ivill repent, and that 
by and by, when it shall be convenient for him to do it, he 
will have no inclination. The minister who finds these errors 
prevailing, should expose them. He should hunt them out, 
and understand just how they are held, and then preach the 
class of truths which will show the fallacy, the folly, and the 
danger of these notions. 

So on the other hand. He may find a people who have 
got such views of Election and Sovereignty, as to think they 
have nothing to do but to wait for the moving of the waters. 
Let him go right over against them, and crowd upon them 
their ability to obey God, and show their obligation and 
duty, and press them with that until he brings them to sub- 
mit and be saved. They have got behind a perverted view 
of these doctrines, and there is no way to drive them out 
of the hiding-place but to set them right on these points. 
"Wherever a sinner is intrenched, unless you pour light upon 
him there, you will never move him. It is of no use to press 
him with those truths which he admits, however plainly 
they may in fact contradict his wrong notions. He supjwses 
them to be perfectly consistent, and does not see the incon- 
sistency, and therefore it will not move him, or bring him to 
repentance. 

I have been informed of a minister in New England, who 
was settled in a congregation which had long enjoyed little 



192 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

else than Arminian preaching, and the congregation them- 
selves were chiefly Arminians. Well, this minister, in his 
preaching, strongly insisted on the opposite points, the 
doctrine of election, Divine sovereignty, predestination, etc. 
The consequence was, as might have been expected where 
this was done with ability, there was a powerful revival. 
Some time afterwards this same minister was called to labor 
in another field, in this State, where the people were all on 
the other side, and strongly tinctured with Antinomianism. 
They had got such perverted views of election, and Divine 
sovereignty, that they were continually saying they had no 
power to do anything, but must wait God's time. Now, 
what does this minister do but immediately go to preaching 
the doctrine of election. And when he was asked, how he 
could think of preaching the doctrine of election so much to 
that people, when it was the very thing that lulled them to a 
deeper slumber, he replied "Why, that's the very class of 

truths by which I had such a great revival in ;" not 

considering the difference in the views of the people. And 
if I am correctly informed, there he is to this day, preaching 
away at the doctrine of election, and wondering that it does 
not produce as powerful a revival as it did in the other place. 
Probably those sinners never will be converted. You must 
take things as they are, find out where sinners he, >and pour 
in truth upon them there, and STAET THEM OUT from 
their refuges of lies. It is of vast importance that a minister 
should find out where the congregation are, and preach ac- 
cordingly. 

I have been in many places in times of revival, and I have 
never been able to employ precisely the same course of preach- 
ing in one as in another. Some are intrenched behind one 
refuge, and some behind another. In one place, the church 
will need to be instructed, in another, sinners. In one place, 
one set of truths, in another, another set. A minister must 
find out where they are, and preach accordingly. I believe 
this is the experience of all preachers who are called to labor 
from field to field. 

5. If a minister means to promote a revival, he should be 
very careful not to introduce controversy. He will grieve 
away the Spirit of God. In this way probably more revivals 
are put down, than in any other. Look back upon the history 
of the church from the beginning, and you will see that minis- 
ters are generally responsible for grieving avf ay the Spirit and 
causing declensions by controversy. It is the ministers who 
bring forward controversial subjects for discussion, and by 



HOW TO PEEACH THE GOSPEL. 193 

and by they get very zealous on the subject, and then get the 
church into a controversial spirit, and so the Spirit of God is 
grieved away. 

If I had time to go over the history of the church from the 
days of the Apostles, I could show that all the controversies 
that have taken place, and all the great declensions in religion, 
too, were chargeable upon ministers. I believe the ministers 
of the present day are responsible for the present state of the 
church, and it will be seen to be true at the judgment. Who 
does not know that ministers have been crying out " Heresy, " 
and "New Measures," and talking about the "Evils of Eevi- 
vals," until they have got the church all in confusion ? Look 
at the poor Presbyterian church, and see ministers getting up 
their Act and Testimony, and keeping up a continual war ! 
O God, have mercy on ministers. They talk about their days 
of fasting and prayer, but are these the men to call on others 
to fast and pray ? They ought to fast and pray themselves. 
It is time that ministers should assemble together, and fast 
and pray over the evil of controversy, for they have caused 
it. The church itself never would get into a controversial 
spirit unless led into it by ministers. The body of the church 
are always averse to controversy, and will keep out of it, only 
as they are dragged into it by ministers. When Christians 
are revived they are not inclined to meddle with controversy, 
either to read or hear it. But they may be told of such and 
such " damnable heresies," that are afloat, till they get their 
feelings enlisted in controversy, and then farewell to the revi- 
val. If a minister, in preaching, finds it necessary to discuss 
particular points, about which Christians differ in opinion, let 
him BY ALL MEANS avoid a controversial spirit and manner 
of doing it.* 

6. The Gospel should be preached in (hose proportions, that 
the whole Gospel may be brought before the minds of the peo- 
ple, and produce its proper influence. If too much stress is 
laid on one class of truths, the Christian character will not 
have its due proportions. Its symmetry will not be perfect. If 
that class of truths be almost exclusively dwelt upon, that re- 
quires great exertion of intellect, without being brought home 
to the heart and conscience, it will be found that the church 
will be indoctrinated in those views, will have their heads filled 
with notions, but will not be awake, and active, and efficient 
in the promotion of religion. If, on the other hand, the 
preaching be loose, indefinite, exhortatory, and highly impas- 

* This was said with, pain in 1833-4. 
9 



194 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

sioned, the church will be like a ship, with too much sail for 
her ballast. It will be in danger of being swept away by a 
tempest of feeling, where there is not sufficient knowledge to 
prevent their being carried away with every wind of doctrine. 
If election and sovereignty are too much preached, there will 
be Antinomianism in the church, and sinners will hide them- 
selves behind the delusion that they can do nothing. If the 
other doctrines of ability and obligation are too prominent, 
they will produce Arminianism in the church, and sinners will 
be blustering and self-confident. • 

When I entered the ministry, there had been so much said 
about the doctrine of election and sovereignty, that I found 
it was the universal hiding place, both of sinners and of the 
church, that they could not do anything, or could not obey the 
Gospel. And wherever I went, I found it indispensable to de- 
molish these refuges of lies. And a revival would in no way 
be produced or carried on, but by dwelling on that class of 
truths, which holds up man's ability, and obligation, and re- 
sponsibility. This was the only class of truths that would 
bring sinners to submission. 

It was not so in the days when President Edwards and 
"Whitefield labored. Then the churches in New England had 
enjoyed little else than Arminian preaching, and were all rest- 
ing in themselves and their own strength. These bold and 
devoted servants of God came out and declared those particu- 
lar doctrines of grace, Divine sovereignty, and election, and 
they were greatly blessed. They did not dwell on these doc- 
trines exclusively, but they preached them very fully. The 
consequence was, that because in those circumstances revivals 
followed from such preaching, the ministers who followed, 
continued to preach these doctrines almost exclusively. And they 
dwelt on them so long, that the church and the world got in- 
trenched behind them, waiting for God to come and do what 
he required them to do, and so revivals ceased for many years. 

Now, and for years past, ministers have been engaged in 
hunting them out from these refuges. And here it is all im- 
portant for the ministers of this day to bear in mind, that if 
they dwell exclusively on ability and obligation, they will get 
their hearers back on the old Arminian ground, and then 
they will cease to promote revivals. Here are a body of min- 
isters who have preached a great deal of truth, and have had 
great revivals, under God. Now let it be known and remarked, 
that the reason is, they have hunted sinners out from then- 
hiding places. But if they continue to dwell on the same 
class of truths till sinners hide themselves behind then preach- 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 195 

ing, another class of truths must be preached. And then if 
they do not change their mode, another pall will hang over 
the church, until anqther class of ministers shall arise and 
hunt sinners out of those new retreats. 

A right view of both classes of truths, election and free- 
agency, will do no hurt. They are eminently calculated to 
convert sinners and strengthen saints. It is a perverted view 
which chills the heart of the church, and closes the eyes of 
sinners in sleep, till they sink down to hell. If I had time I 
would remark on the manner in which I have sometimes 
heard the doctrines of Divine sovereignty, election, and ability 
preached. They have been exhibited in irreconcilable con- 
tradiction, the one against the other. Such exhibitions are 
anything but the Gospel, and are calculated to make a 
sinner feel anything else rather than his responsibility to 
God. 

By preaching truth in proper proportions, I do not mean 
mingling all things together in the same sermon, in such a 
way that sinners will not see then* connection or consistency. 
A minister once asked another, "Why do you not preach the 
doctrine of election ? Because, said the other, I find sinners 
here are intrenched behind inability. The first then said he 
once knew a minister who used to preach election in the fore- 
noon, and repentance in the afternoon. Marvellous grace it 
must be, that would produce a revival under such preaching ! 
What connection is there in this ? Instead of exhibiting to the 
sinner his sins in the morning, and then and in the afternoon 
calling on him to repent, he is first turned to the doctrine of 
election, and then commanded to repent. WTiat is he to re- 
pent of ? The doctrine of election ? This is not what I mean 
by preaching truth in its proportion. Bringing things to- 
gether, that only confound the sinner's mind, and overwhelm 
h im with a fog of metaphysics, is not wise preaching. WTien 
talking of election, the preacher is not talking of the sinner's 
duty. It has no relation to the sinner's duty. Election be- 
longs to the government of God. It is a part of the exceed- 
ing richness of the grace of God. It shows the love of God, 
not the duty of the sinner. And to bring election and repent- 
ance together in this way is diverting the sinner's mind away 
from his duty. It has been customary, in many places, for a 
long time, to bring the doctrine of election into every sermon. 
Sinners have been commanded to repent, and told that they 
could not repent, in the same sermon. A great deal of inge- 
nuity has been exercised in endeavoring to reconcile a sinner's 
" inability" with his obligation to obey God. Election, pre- 



198 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

destination, free-agency, inability, and duty, have all been 
thrown together in one promiscuous jumble. And with regard 
to many sermons, it has been too true, ^as has been objected, 
that ministers have preached, " You "can and jon can't, 
you shall and you sha'n't, you will and you won't, and 
you'll be damned if you don't." Such a mixture of truth 
and error, of light and darkness, has confounded the congre- 
gation, and been the fruitful source of Universalism and every 
species of infidelity and error. 

7. It is of great importance that the sinner should be made 
to feel his guilt, and not left to the impression that he is un- 
fortunate. I think this is a very prevailing fault, particularly 
with printed books on the subject. They are calculated to 
make the sinner think more of his sorrows than of his sins, 
and feel that his state is rather unfortunate than criminal. 
Perhaps most of you have seen a very lovely little book re- 
cently published, entitled "Todd's Lectures to Children." It 
is very fine, exquisitely fine, and happy in some of its illustra- 
tions of truth. But it has one very serious fault. Many of 
its illustrations, I may say most of them, are not calculated 
to make a correct impression respecting the guilt of sinners, 
or to make them feel how much they have been to blame. 
This is very unfortunate. If the writer had guarded his illus- 
trations on this point, so as to make them impress sinners 
with a sense of their guilt, I do not see how a child could 
read through that book and not be converted. 

Multitudes of the books written for children, and for adults 
too, within the last twenty years, have run into this mistake 
to an alarming degree. Mrs. Sherwood's writings have this 
fault standing out upon almost every page. They are not cal- 
culated to make the sinner blame and condemn himself. Un- 
til you can do this, the Gospel will never take effect 

8. A prime object with the preacher must be to make pres- 
ent obligation felt. I have talked, I suppose, with many thou- 
sands of anxious sinners. And I have found that they had 
never before felt the pressuf e of present obligation. The im- 
pression is not commonly made by ministers in their preach- 
ing that sinners are expected to repent NOW. And if minis- 
ters suppose they make this impression, they deceive them- 
selves. Most commonly any other impression is made upon 
the minds of sinners by the preacher, than that they are ex- 
pected now to submit. Bat what sort of a gospel is this ? 
Does God authorize such an impression ? Is this according 
to the preaching of Jesus Christ ? Does the Holy Spirit, 
when striving with the sinner, make the impression upon his 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 197 

mind that he is not expected to obey now ? — Was any such 
impression produced by the preaching of the apostles ? How 
does it happen that so many ministers now preach, so as in 
fact to make an impression on their hearers, that they are not 
expected to repent now? Until the sinner's conscience is 
reached on this subject, you preach to him in vain. And until 
ministers learn how to preach so as to make the right impres- 
sion, the world never can be converted. Oh, to what an alarm- 
ing extent does the impression now prevail among the impeni- 
tent, that they are not expected to repent now, but must wait 
God's time ! 

9. Sinners ought to be made to feel that they have some- 
thing to do, and that is to repent ; that it is something which 
no other being can do for them, neither God nor man, and 
something which they $an do, and do now. Keligkm is some- 
thing to do, not something to wait for. And they must do it 
now, or they are in danger of eternal death. 

10. Ministers should never rest satisfied, until they have 
ANNIHILATED every excuse of sinners. The plea of " in- 
ability" is the worst of all excuses. It slanders God so, charg- 
ing him with infinite tyranny, in commanding men to do that 
which they have no power to do. Make the sinner see and 
feel that this is the very nature of his excuse. Make the sin- 
ner see that all pleas in excuse for not submitting to God, are 
an act of rebellion against him. Tear away the last LIE 
which he grasps in his hand, and make him feel that he is 
absolutely condemned before God. 

11. Sinners should be made to feel that if they now grieve 
away the Spirit of God, it is very probable that they will be 
lost for ever. There is infinite danger of this. They should 
be made to understand why they are dependent on the Spirit, 
and that it is not because they cannot do what God commands, 
but because they are unwilling ; but that they are so unwilling 
that it is just as certain they will not repent without the Holy 
Ghost, as if they were now in hell, or as if they were actually 
unable. They are so opposed and so unwilling, that they 
never will repent in the world, unless God sends his Holy 
Spirit upon them. 

Show them, too, that a sinner under the Gospel, who hears 
the truth preached, if converted at all, is generally converted 
young. And if not converted while young, he is commonly 
given up of God. Where the truth is preached, sinners are 
either gospel-hardened or converted. I know some old sin- 
ners are converted, but they are rather exceptions, and by no 
means common. 



198 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

I wish now, secondly, to make a few remarks on the manner 

OF PREACHING. 

1. It should be conversational. Preaching, to be under- 
stood, should be colloquial in its style. A minister must 
preach just as he would talk, if he wishes to be fully under- 
stood. Nothing is more calculated to make a sinner feel that 
religion is some mysterious thing that he cannot understand, 
than this mouthing, formal, lofty style of speaking, so gener- 
ally employed in the pulpit. The minister ought to do as the 
lawyer does when he wants to make a jury understand him 
perfectly. He uses a style perfectly colloquial. This lofty, 
swelling style will do no good. The Gospel will never pro- 
duce any great effects, until ministers talk to their hearers, in 
the pulpit, as they talk in private conversation. 

2. It must be in the language of common life. Not only 
should it be colloquial in its style, but the words should be 
such as are in common use. Otherwise they will not be 
understood. In the New Testament you will observe that 
Jesus Christ invariably uses words of the most common kind. 
You scarcely find a word of his instructions, that any child 
cannot understand. The language of the gospels is the plain- 
est, simplest, and most easily understood of any language in 
the world. 

For a minister to neglect this principle, is wicked. Some 
ministers use language that is purely technical in preaching. 
They think to avoid the mischief by explaining the meaning 
fully at the outset ; but this will not answer. It will not effect 
the object in making the people understand what he means. 
If he uses a word that is not in common use, and that people 
do not understand, his explanation may be very full, but the 
difficcdty is that people will forget his explanations and then 
his words are all Greek to them. Or if he uses a word in 
common use, but employs it in an uncommon sense, giving his 
special explanations, it is no better ; for the people will soon 
forget his special explanations, and then the impression actu- 
ally conveyed to their minds will be according to their common 
understanding of the word. And thus he will never convey 
the right idea to his congregation. It is amazing how many 
men of thinking minds there are in congregations, who do 
not understand the most common technical expressions em- 
ployed by ministers, such as regeneration, sanctification, etc. 

Use words that can be perfectly understood. Do not, for 
fear of appearing unlearned, use language half Latin and half 
Greek, which the people do not understand. The apostle 
says the man is a barbarian, who uses taaiguage that the peo- 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 199 

pie do not understand. And " if the trumpet give an uncer- 
tain sound, who .shall prepare himself for the battle ? " In 
the apostles' days there were some preachers, who were mar- 
vellously proud of displaying their command of language, 
and showing off the variety of tongues they could speak, 
which the common people could not understand. The apostle 
rebukes this spirit sharply, and says, " I had rather speak five 
words with my understanding, that by my voice I might 
teach others also, than ten thousand words in an unknown 
tongue." 

I have sometimes heard ministers preach, even when there 
was a revival, when I have wondered what that part of the 
congregation would do, who had no dictionary. So many 
phrases were brought in, manifestly to adorn the discourse, 
rather than to instruct the people, that I have felt as if I 
wanted to tell the man, " Sit down, and not confound the peo- 
ple's minds with your barbarian preaching, that they cannot 
understand" 

3. Preaching should be parabolical. That is, illustrations 
should be constantly used, drawn from incidents, real or sup- 
posed. Jesus Christ constantly illustrated his instructions in 
this way. He would either advance a principle and then illus- 
trate it by a parable, that is, a short story of some event real 
or imaginary, or else he would bring out the principle in the 
parable. There are millions of facts that can be used to ad- 
vantage, and yet very few ministers dare to use them, for fear 
somebody will reproach them. "Oh," says somebody, " he 
tells stories." Tells stories! Why. that is the way Jesus 
Christ preached. And it is the only way to preach. Facts, 
real or supposed, should be used to show the truth. Truths 
not illustrated, are generally just as well calculated to convert 
sinners as a mathematical demonstration. Is it always to be 
so? Shall it always be matter of reproach, that ministers 
follow the example of Jesus Christ, in illustrating truths by 
facts ? Let them do it, and let fools reproach them as story- 
telling ministers. They have Jesus Christ and common sense 
on their side. 

4. The illustrations should be drawn from common life, and 
the common business of society. I once heard a minister 
illustrate his ideas by the manner in which merchants trans- 
act business in their stores. Another minister who was pres- 
ent made some remarks to him afterwards. He objected to 
this illustration particularly, because, he said, it was too fami- 
lial*, and was letting down the dignity of the pulpit. He said 
all illustration in preaching should be drawn from ancient 



200 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

history, or from some elevated source, that would keep up the 
dignity of the pulpit. Dignity indeed ! Just the language of 
the devil. He rejoices in it. Why, the object of an illustra- 
tion is, to make people see the truth, not to bolster up pulpit 
dignity. A minister whose heart is in the work, does not use 
an illustration to make people st^re, but to make them see the 
truth. If he brought forward his illustrations from ancient 
history, it could not make the people see, it would not illus- 
trate anything. The novelty of the thing might awaken their 
attention, but then they would lose the truth itself. For if 
the illustration itself be a novelty, the attention will be direct- 
ed to this fact as a matter of history, and the truth itself, 
which it was designed to illustrate, will be lost sight of. The 
illustration should, if possible, be a matter of common occur- 
rence, and the more common the occurrence the more sure it 
will be, not to fix attention upon itself, but it serves as a 
medium through which the truth is conveyed. I have been 
pained at the very heart, at hearing illustrations drawn from 
ancient history, of which not one in a hundred of the congre- 
gation had ever heard. The very manner in which they were 
adverted to, was strongly tinctured, to say the least, with the 
appearance of vanity, and an attempt to surprise the people 
with an exhibition of learning. 

The Saviour always illustrated his instructions by things 
that were taking place among the people to whom he preached, 
and with which their minds were familiar. He descended 
often very far below what is now supposed to be essential to 
support the dignity of the pulpit. He talked about the hens 
and chickens, and children in market-places, and sheep and 
lambs, shepherds and farmers, and husbandmen and mer- 
chants. And when he talked about kings, as in the marriage 
of the king's son, and the nobleman that went into a far 
country to receive a kingdom, he had reference to historical 
facts, that were well known among the people at the time. 
The illustration should always be drawn from things so com- 
mon that the illustration itself will not attract attention away 
from the subject, but that people may see through it the truth 
illustrated. 

5. Preaching should be repetitious. If a minister wishes 
to preach with effect, he must not be afraid of repeating 
whatever he sees is not perfectly understood by his hearers. 
Here is the evil of using notes. The preacher preaches 
right along just as he has it written down, and cannot ob- 
serve whether he is understood or not. If he interrupts his 
reading, and attempts to catch the countenances of his audi- 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSrEL. 201 

ence, and to explain where he sees they do not understand, 
he gets lost and confused, and gives it up. If a minister has 
his eves on on the people he is preaching to, he can com- 
monly tell by their looks whether they understand him. And 
if he" sees they do not understand any particular point, let 
him stop and illustrate it. If they do not understand one 
illustration, let him give another, and make it all clear to 
their minds, before he goes on. But those who write their 
sermons go right on, in a regular consecutive train, just as 
in an essay or a book, and do not repeat their thoughts till 
the audience fully comprehend them. 

I was conversing with one of the first advocates in this 
country. He said the difficulty which preachers find in mak- 
ing themselves understood, is, that they do not repeat enough. 
Says he, " In addressing a jury, I always expect that what- 
ever I wish to impress upon their minds, I shall have to re- 
peat at least twice, and often I repeat it three or four times, 
and even as many times as there are jurymen before me. 
Otherwise, I do not carry their minds along with me, so that 
they can feel the force of what comes afterwards." If a 
jury under oath, called to decide on the common affairs of 
this world, cannot apprehend an argument unless there is so 
much repetition, how is it to be expected that men will un- 
derstand the preaching of the Gospel without it. 

In like manner the minister ought to turn an important 
thought over and over before his audience, till even the chil- 
dren understand it perfectly. Do not say that so much repe- 
tition will create disgust in cultivated minds. It will not 
disgust. This is not what disgusts thinking men. They are 
not weary of the efforts a minister makes to be understood, 
The fact is, the more simple a preacher's illustrations are, 
and the more plain he makes everything, the more men of 
mind are interested. I know that men of the first minds 
often get ideas they never had before, from illustrations which 
were designed to bring the Gospel down to the comprehension 
of a child. Such men are commonly so occupied with the 
affairs of this world, that they do not think much on the sub- 
ject of religion, and they therefore need the plainest preach- 
ing, and they will like it. 

6. A minister should always feel deeply his subject, and 
then he will suit the action to the word and the word to the 
action, so as to make the full impression which the truth is 
calculated to make. He should be in solemn earnest in what 
he says. I heard lately a most judicious criticism on this 
subject. " How important it is that a minister should feel 



202 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

•what he says. Then his actions will of course correspond to 
'his words. If he undertakes to make gestures, his arms may 
go like a windmill, and yet make no impression." It requires 
the utmost stretch of art on the stage for the actors to make 
their hearers feel. The design of elocution is to teach this 
skill. But if a man feels his subject fully, he will naturally 
do it. He will naturally do the very thing that elocution 
laboriously teaches. See any common man in the streets, 
who is earnest in talking. See with what force he gestures. 
See a woman or a child in earnest. How natural To ges- 
ture with their hands is as natural as it is to move their 
tongue and lips. It is the perfection of eloquence. 

Let a minister, then, only feel what he says, and not be tied 
to his notes, to read an essay, or to speak a piece, like a school- 
boy, first on one foot and then on the other, put out first one 
liand and then the other. Let him speak as he feels, and 
act as he feels, and he will be eloquent. 

No wonder that a great deal of preaching produces so 
little effect. Gestures are of more importance than is gener- 
ally supposed. Mere words will never express the full mean- 
ing of the Gospel. The manner of saying it is almost every- 
thing. Suppose one of you, that is a mother, goes home to- 
night, and as soon as you get into the door, the nurse comes 
rushing up to you, with her whole soul in her countenance, 
and tells you that your child is burnt to death. You would 
believe it, and you would feel it too, at once. But suppose 
she comes and tells it in a cold and careless manner. Would 
that arouse you ? No. It is the earnestness of her manner, 
and the distress of her looks, that tells the story. You know 
something is the matter before she speaks a word. 

I once heard a remark made, respecting a young minister's 
preaching, which was instructive. He was uneducated, in the 
common sense of the term, but well calculated to win souls. 
It was said of him, " The manner in which he comes in, and 
sits in the pulpit, and rises to speak, is a sermon of itself. 
It shows that he has something to say that is important and 
solemn." That man's manner of saying some things I have 
known to move the feelings of a whole congregation, when 
the same things said in a prosing way would have produced 
no effect at all. 

A fact which was stated by one of the most distinguished 
professors of elocution in the United States, ought to impress 
ministers on this subject. That man was an infidel. He said, 
" I have been fourteen years employed in teaching elocution 
to ministers, and I kno^r they do not believe the Christian 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 203 

religion. The Bible may be true. I do not pretend to know 
as to that, but I know these ministers do not believe it, I 
can demonstrate that they do not. The perfection of my art 
is to teach them to speak naturally on this subject. I go 
to their studies, and converse with them, and they speak elo- 
quently. I say to them, Gentlemen, if you will preach just 
as you yourselves naturally speak on any other subject, in 
which you are interested, you do not need to be taught. That 
is just what I am trying -to teach you. I hear you talk on 
other subjects with admirable force and eloquence. I see 
you go into the pulpit, and you speak and act as if you did 
not believe what you are saving. I have told them, again and 
again, to talk in the pulpit as they naturally talk to me. 
And I cannot make them do it, and so I know they do not be- 
lieve the Christian religion." 

I have mentioned this to show how universal it is, that men 
will gesture right if they feel right. The only thing in the 
way of ministers being natural speakers is, that they do not 
DEEPLY FEEL. How can they be natural in elocution, 
when they do not feel ? 

7. A minister should aim to convert his congregation. But 
you will ask, Does not all preaching aim at this ? No. A 
minister always has some aim in preaching, but most sermons 
were never aimed at converting sinners. And if sinners 
were converted under them, the preacher himself would be 
amazed. I once heard a fact on this point. There were 
two young ministers who had entered the ministry at the 
same time. One of them had great success in converting 
sinners, the other none. The latter inquired of the other, one 
day, what was the reason of this difference. "Why/ 3 replied 
the other, " the reason is, that I aim at a different end from 
you, in preaching. My object is to convert sinners, but you 
aim at no such thing. And then you go and lay it to sov- 
ereignty in God, that you do not produce the same effect, 
when you never aim at it. Here, take one of my sermons, 
and preach it to your people, and see what the effect will be." 
The man did so, and preached the sermon, and it did pro- 
duce effect. He was frightened when sinners began to weep ; 
and when one came to him after meeting to ask what he 
should do, the minister apologized to him, and said, " I did 
not aim to wound you, I am sorry if I have hurt your feel- 
ings." Oh, horrible ! 

8. A minister must anticipate the objections of sinners, and 
answer them. What does the lawyer do when pleading be- 
fore a jury ? Oh, how differently is the cause of Jesus Christ 



204 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

pleaded from human causes ! It was remarked by a lawyer, 
that the cause of Jesus Christ had the fewest able advocates 
of any cause in the world. And I partly believe it. Does a 
lawyer go along in his argument in a regular train, and not 
explain anything obscure, or anticipate the arguments of 
his antagonist ? If he did so, he would lose his case to a 
certainty. But, no. The lawyer, who is pleading for money, 
anticipates every objection, which may be made by his antag- 
onist, and carefully removes or explains them, so as to leave 
the ground all clear as he goes along, that the jury may be 
settled on every point. But ministers often leave one diffi- 
culty and another untouched. Sinners who hear them feel 
the difficulty, and it is never got over in their minds, and 
they never know how to remove it, and perhaps the minister 
never takes the trouble to know that such difficulties exist, 
and yet he wonders why his congregation is not converted, 
and why there is no revival. How can he wonder at it, when 
he has never hunted up the difficulties and objections that 
sinners feel, and removed them ? 

9. If a minister means to preach the Gospel with effect he 
must be sure not to be monotonous. If he preaches in a mo- 
notonous way, he will preach the people to sleep. Any mo- 
notonous sound, great or small, if continued, disposes people 
to sleep. The falls of Niagara, the roaring of the ocean, or 
any sound ever so great or small, has this effect naturally on 
the nervous system. You never hear this monotonous man- 
ner from people in conversation. And a minister cannot be 
monotonous in preaching, if he feels what he says. 

10. A minister should address the feelings enough to secure 
attention, and then deal toith the conscience, and probe to the 
quick. Appeals to the feelings alone will never convert sin- 
ners. If the preacher deals too much in these, he may get up 
an excitement, and have wave after wave of feeling flow over 
the congregation, and people may be carried away as with a 
flood, and rest in false hopes. The only way to secure sound con- 
versions is to deal faithfully with the conscience. If attention 
flags at any time, appeal to the feelings again, and rouse it up ; 
but do your work with conscience. 

11. If he can, it is desirable that a minister should learn 
the effect of one sermon, before he preaches another. Let him 
learn if it is understood, if it has produced any impression, 
if any difficulties are felt in regard to the subject which need 
clearing up, if any objections are raised, and the like. When 
Jie knows it all, then he knows what to preach next. What 
would be thought of the physician who should give medicine 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 205 

to his patient, and then give it again and again, without try- 
ing to learn the effect of the first, or whether it had produced 
any effect or not ? A minister never will be able to deal with 
sinners* as he ought, till he can find out whether his instruc- 
tion has been received and understood, and whether the dif- 
ficulties in sinners' minds are cleared away, and their path 
open to the Saviour, so that they need not stumble and stum- 
ble till then* souls are lost. 

I had designed to notice several other points, but time does 
not admit. I wish to close with a few 

REMARKS. 

1. We see why so few of the leading minds in many com- 
munities are converted. 

Until the late revivals, professional men were rarely reached 
by preaching, and they were almost all infidels at heart. Peo- 
ple almost understood the Bible to warrant the idea, that they 
could not be converted. The reason is obvious. The Gospel 
had not been commended to the consciences of such men. 
Ministers had not grappled with mind, and reasoned so as to 
make that class of mind see the truth of the Gospel, and feel 
its power, and consequently such persons had come to regard 
religion as something unworthy their notice. 

But of late years the case is altered, and in some places 
there have been more of this class of persons converted, in 
proportion to their • numbers, than of any others. That is 
because they were made to understand the claims of the Gos- 
pel. The preacher grappled with their minds, and showed 
them the reasonableness of religion. And when this is done, 
it is found that that class of minds are more easily converted 
than any other. They have so much better capacity to re- 
ceive an argument, and are so much more in the habit of 
yielding to the force of reason, that as soon as the Gospel 
gets a fair hold of their minds, it breaks them right down, 
and melts them at the feet of Christ. 

2. Before the Gospel can take general effect, we must have 
a class of extempore preachers, for the following reasons : 

(1.) No set of men can stand the labor of writing sermons 
and doing all the preaching which will be requisite. 

(2.) "Written preaching is not calculated to produce the 
requisite effect. Such preaching does not present truth in 
the right shape. 

(3.) It is impossible for a man who writes his sermons to 
arrange his matter, and turn and choose his thoughts, so as 



206 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

to produce the same effect as when he addresses the people 
directly, and makes them feel that he means them. Writing 
sermons had its origin in times of political difficulty. The 
practice was unknown in the apostles' days. No doubt writ- 
ten sermons have done a great deal of good, but they can 
never give to the Gospel its great power. Perhaps many 
ministers have been so long trained in the use of notes, that 
they had better not throw them away. Perhaps they would 
make bad work without them. The difficulty would not be 
for the want of mind, but from wrong training. The bad 
habit is begun with the school boy, who is called to " speak 
his piece." Instead of being set to express his own thoughts 
and feelings in his own language, and with his own natural 
manner, such as nature herself prompts, he is made to com- 
mit another person's writing to memory, and then mouths it 
out in a stiff and formal way. And so^when he goes to col- 
lege, and to the seminary, instead of being trained to extem- 
pore speaking, he is set to writing his piece, and commit 
it to memory. I would pursue the opposite course from the 
beginning. I would give him a subject, and let him first 
think, and then speak his thoughts. Perhaps he will make 
mistakes. Very well, that is to be expected — in a beginner. 
But he will learn. Suppose he is not eloquent, at first. Very 
well, he can improve. And he is in the very way to improve. 
This kind of training alone will ever raise up a class of min- 
isters who can convert the world. 

But it is objected to extemporaneous preaching, that if 
ministers do not write, they will not think. This objection 
will have weight with those men whose habit has always been 
to write down their thoughts. But to a man of a different 
habit, it will have no weight at all. Writing is not thinking. 
And if I should judge from many of the written ser- 
mons I have heard preached, the makers of them had 
been doing anything rather than thinking. The mechanical 
labor of writing is really a hinderance to close and rapid 
thought. It is true that some extempore preachers have not 
been men of thought. And so it is true that many men who 
write sermons, are not men of thought. A man whose habits 
have always been such, that he has thought only when he has 
put his mind on the end of his pen, will of course, if he lays 
aside his pen, at first find it difficult to think ; and if he 
attempts to preach without writing, will, until his habits are 
thoroughly changed, find it difficult to throw into his sermons 
* the same amount of thought, as if he conformed to his old 
habits of writing. But it should be remembered that this is 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 20 7 

only on account of his having been trained to write, and hay- 
ing always habituated himself to it. It is the training and 
habit that renders it so difficult for him to think without 
writing. Will any body pretend to say that lawyers are not 
men of thought ? That their arguments before a court and jury, 
are not profound and well digested ? And yet every one knows 
that they do not write then speeches. It should be under- 
stood, too, that in college, they have the same training with 
ministers, and have the same disadvantage of having been 
trained to write their thoughts ; and it is only after they en- 
ter upon their profession, that they change their habit. Were 
they educated, as they should be, to extempore habits in the 
schools, they would be vastly more eloquent and powerful in 
argument than they are. 

I have heard much of this objection to extempore preach- 
ing ever since I entered the ministry. It was often said to 
me then, in answer to my views of extempore preaching, that 
ministers who preached extemporaneously, would not instruct 
the churches, that there would be^a great deal of sameness in 
their preaching, and they would soon become insipid and 
repetitious for want of thought. But every year's experience 
has ripened the conviction on my mind, that the reverse of 
this objection is true. The man who writes least may, if he 
pleases, think most, and wall say what he does think 4n a man- 
ner that will be better understood than if it were written ; 
and that, just in the proportion that he lays aside the labor 
of writing, his body will be left free to exercise, and his mind 
to vigorous and consecutive thought. 

The great reason why it is supposed that extempore preach- 
ers more frequently repeat the same thoughts in their preach- 
ing, is because what # they say is, in a general way, more per- 
fectly remembered by the congregation, than if it had been 
read. I have often known preachers, who could repeat their 
written sermons once in a few months, without its being re- 
cognised by the congregation. But the manner in which ex- 
tempore sermons are generally delivered is so much more 
impressive, that the thoughts cannot in general be soon re- 
peated, without being remembered. We shall never have a 
set of men in our halls of legislation, in our courts of justice, 
and in our pulpits, that are powerful and overwhelming 
speakers, and can carry the world before them, till our sys- 
tem of education teaches them to think, closely, rapidly, con- 
secutively, and till all their habits of speaking in the schools 
are extemporaneous. The very style of communicating 
thought, in what is commonly called a good style of writing, 



208 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

is not calculated to leave a deep impression on the mind, or 
to communicate thought in a clear and impressive manner. 
It is not laconic, direct, pertinent. It is not the language of 
nature. It is impossible that gestures should be suited to the 
common style of writing. And consequently, when they at- 
tempt to gesture in reading an essay, or delivering a written 
sermon, their gestures are a burlesque upon all public speak- 
ing. 

In delivering a sermon in this essay style of writing, it is 
impossible that nearly all the fire of meaning and power of 
gesture, and looks, and attitude, and emphasis should not be 
lost. We can never have the full meaning of the Gospel, till 
we throw away our notes. 

3. A minister's course of study and training for his work 
should be exclusively theological. 

I mean just as I say. I am not now going to discuss the 
question whether all education ought not to be theological. 
But I say education for the ministry should be exclusively so. 
But you will ask, Should not a minister understand science ? 
I would answer, Yes, the more the better. I would that 
ministers might understand all science. But it should all be 
in connection with theology. Studying science is studying 
the works of God. And studying theology is studying God. 

Let st scholar be asked, for instance, this question : " Is 
there a God ?" To answer it, let him ransack the universe, 
let him go out into every department of science, to find the 
proofs of design, and in this way to learn the existence of 
God. Let him next inquire how many gods there are, and 
let him again ransack creation to see whether there is such a 
unity of design as evinces that there is one God. In like 
manner, let him inquire concerning the attributes of God, 
and his character. He will learn science here, but will learn 
it as a part of theology. Let him search every field of 
knowledge, to bring forward his proofs. What was the de- 
sign of this plan ? What was the end of that arrangement ? 
See whether everything you find in the universe is not calcu- 
lated to produce happiness, unless perverted. 

Would the student's heart get hard and cold in study, as 
cold and hard as the college walls, if science was pursued in 
this way ? Every lesson brings him right up before God, and 
is in fact communion with God, and warms his heart, and 
makes him more pious, more solemn, more holy. The very 
distinction between classical and theological study is a curse 
to the church, and a curse to the world. The student spends 
four years in college at classical studies, and no God in them, 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 209 

and then three years in the seminary, at tlieohgical studies ; 
and what then ? Poor young man. Set him to work, and 
you will find that he is not educated for the ministry at all. 
The church groans under his preaching, because he does not 
preach with unction, nor with power. He has been spoiled 
in training. 

4. We learn what is revival peaching. All ministers should 
be revival ministers, and all preaching should be revival 
preaching ; that is, it should be calculated to promote holiness. 
People say, " It is very well to have some men in the church, 
who are revival preachers, and who can go about aud promote 
revivals ; but then you must have others to indoctrinate the 
church." Strange ! Do they not know that a revival indoc- 
trinates the church faster than anything else ? And a minis- 
ter will never produce a revival, if he does not indoctrinate 
his hearers. The preaching I have described, is full of doc- 
trine, but it is doctrine to be practised. And that is revival 
preaching. 

5. There are two objections sometimes brought against the 
kind of preaching which I have recommended. 

(1.) That it is letting down the dignity of the pulpit to preach 
in this colloquial, lawyer-like style. They are shocked at it. 
But it is only on account of its novelty, and not for any im- 
propriety there is in the thing itself. I heard a remark made 
by a leading layman in the centre of this State, in regard to 
the preaching of a certain minister. He said it was the first 
preaching he ever heard, that he understood, and the first 
minister he ever heard that spoke as if he believed his own 
doctrine, or meant what he said. And when he first heard 
him preach as if he was saying something that he meant, he 
thought he was crazy. But eventually, he was made to see 
that it was all true, and he submitted to the truth, as the 
power of God for the salvation of his soul. 

"What is the dignity of the pulpit ? To see a minister go 
into the pulpit to sustain its dignity ! Alas, alas ! During my 
foreign tour, I heard an English missionary preach exactly in 
that way. I believe he was a good man, and out of the pul- 
pit he would talk like a man that meant what he said. But 
no sooner was he in the pulpit, than he appeared like a per- 
fect automaton — swelling, mouthing, and singing, enough to 
put all the people to sleep. And the difficulty seemed to be, 
that he wanted to maintain the dignity of the pulpit. 

(2.) It is objected that this preaching is theatrical. The 
bishop of London once asked Garrick, the celebrated play- 
actor, why it was that actors, in representing a mere fiction, 



210 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

should move an assembly, even to tears, while ministers, in 
representing the most solemn realities, could scarcely obtain 
a hearing. The philosophical Garrick well replied, " It is be- 
cause we represent fiction as reality, and you represent reality 
as a fiction.'' This is telling the whole story. Now what is 
the design of the actor in a theatrical representation ? It is 
so to throw himself into the spirit and meaning of the writer, 
as to adopt his sentiments, make them his own, feel them, 
embody them, throw them out upon the audience as living 
reality. And now, what is the objection to all this in preach- 
ing ? The actor suits the action to the word, and the word 
to the action. His looks, his hands, his attitudes, and every- 
thing are designed to express the full meaning of the writer. 
Now this should be the aim of the preacher. And if by 
" theatrical" be meant the strongest possible representation of 
the sentiments expressed, then the more theatrical a sermon 
is, the better. And if ministers are too stifij and the people 
too fastidious, to learn even from an actor, or from the stage, 
the best method of swaying- mind, of enforcing sentiment, 
and diffusing the warmth of burning thought over a congre- 
gation, then they must go on with their prosing, and reading, 
and sanctimonious starch. But let them remember, that 
while they are thus turning away and decrying the art of the 
actor, and attempting to support "the dignity of the pulpit," 
the theatres can be thronged every night. The common-sense 
people will be entertained with that manner of speaking, and 
sinners will go down to hell. 

6. A congregation may learn how to choose a minister. 

When a vacant church are looking out for a minister, there 
are iwo leading points on which they commonly fix their atten- 
tion. (1.) That he should be popular. (2.) That he should 
be learned. That is very well. But this point should be the 
first in their inquiries — " Is he wise to win souls ? " No matter 
how eloquent a minister is, or how learned. No matter how 
pleasing and popular in his manners. If it is a matter of fact 
that sinners are not converted under his preaching, it shows 
that he has not this wisdom, and your children and neighbors 
will go down to hell under his preaching. 

I am happy to know that many churches will ask this ques- 
tion about ministers. And if they find that a minister is des- 
titute of this vital quality, they will not have him. And if 
ministers can be found who are wise to win souls, the churches 
will have such ministers. It is in vain to contend against it, 
or to pretend that they are not well educated, or not learned, 
or the like. It is in vain for the schools to try to force down 



HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 211 

the throats of the churches a race of ministers who are learned 
in everything but what they most need to know. The churches 
have pronounced them not made right, and they will not sus- 
tain that which is notoriously so inadequate as the present 
system of theological education. 

It is very difficult to say what needs to be said on this sub- 
ject, without being in danger of begetting a wrong spirit in 
the church, towards ministers. Many professors of religion 
are ready to find fault with ministers when they have no rea- 
son ; insomuch, that it becomes very difficult to say of min- 
isters what is true, and what needs to be said, without its 
being perverted and abused by this class of professors. I 
would not for the world say anything to injure the influence 
of a minister of Christ, who is really endeavoring to do good. 
I would that they deserved a hundred times more influence 
than they now deserve or have. But, to tell the truth will not 
injure the influence of those ministers, who by their lives and 
preaching give evidence to the church, that their object is to 
do good, and win souls to Christ. This class of ministers will 
recognise the truth of all that I have said, or wish to say. 
They see it all, and deplore it. But if there be ministers who 
are doing no good, who are feeding "themselves and not the 
flock, such ministers deserve no influence. If they are doing 
no good, it is time for them to betake themselves to some 
other profession. They are but leeches on the very vitals of 
the church, sucking out its heart's*blood. They are useless, 
and worse than useless. And the sooner they are laid aside, 
and their places filled with those who will exert themselves for 
Christ the better. 

Finally — It is the duty of the church to pray for us, min- 
isters. Not one of us is such as we ought to be. Like Paul, 
we can say, " Who is suificient for these things ? " But who 
of us is like Paul ? Where will you find such a minister as 
Paul ? They are not here. We have been wrongly educated, 
all of us. Pray for the schools, and colleges, and seminaries. 
And pray for young men who are preparing for the ministry. 
Pray for ministers, that God would give them this wisdom to 
win souls. And pray that God would bestow upon the church 
the wisdom and the means to educate a generation of minis- 
ters who will go forward and convert the world. The church 
must travail in prayer, and groan and agonize for this. This 
is now the pearl of price to the church, to have a supply of 
the right sort of ministers. The corning of the millennium de- 
pends on having a different sort of ministers, who are more 
thoroughly educated for their work. And this we shall have so 



212 HOW TO PREACH THE GOSPEL. 

sure as the promise of the Lord holds good. Such a minis- 
try as is now in the church will never convert the world. But 
the world is to be converted, and therefore God intends to 
have ministers who will do it. " Pray ye, therefore, the Lord 
of the harvest, that he would send forth laborers into his 
harvest." 



LECTUBE XIH. 



HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

Text.— And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed ; 
and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed. Bnt Moses's hands were heavy : 
and they took a stone, and put it under him, and he sat thereon : and Aaron and 
Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side and the other on the other side ; 
and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. And Joshua discom- 
fited Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword.— Exodus xvii. 11-13. 

You who read your Bibles will recollect the connection in 
which these verses stand. The people of God in subduing 
their enemies came to battle against the Amalekites, and 
these incidents took place. It is difficult to conceive why im- 
portance should be attached to the circumstance of Moses 
holding up his hands, unless the expression is understood 
to denote the attitude of prayer. And then his holding up 
his hands, and the success attending it, will teach us the im- 
portance of prayer to God, for his aid in all our conflicts 
with the enemies of God. The co-operation and support of 
Aaron and Hur have been generally understood to represent 
the duty of churches to sustain and assist ministers in their 
work, and the importance of this co-operation to the success 
of the preached Gospel. I shall make this use of it on the 
present occasion. As I have spoken of the duty of ministers 
to labor for revivals, I shall now consider, 

THE IMPORTANCE OF THE CO-OPERATION OF THE CHURCH IN 
PRODUCING AND CARRYING ON A REVIVAL. 

There are a number of things whose importance in promot- 
ing a revival has not been duly considered by churches and 
ministers, which if not. attended to will make it impossible 
that revivals should extend, or even continue for any consid- 
erable time. In my last two lectures, I have been dwelling 
on the duties of ministers, as it was impossible for me to 
preach a course of lectures on revivals without entering more 
or less extensively into that department of means. I have 
not done with that part of the subject, but have thought it 
important here to step aside and discuss some points in 
which the church must stand by and aid their minister, if 

(213) 






214 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

they expect to enjoy a revival. In discussing the subject, I 
propose, 

I. To mention several things which Christians must avoid, 
if they would support ministers. 

II. Some things to which they must attend. 

I. I am to mention several things that must be avoided. 

1. By all means keep clear of the idea, both in theory and 
practice, that a minister is to promote revivals alone. Many 
people are inclined to take a passive attitude on this subject, 
and feel as if they had nothing to do. They have employed 
a minister and paid him, to feed them with instruction and 
comfort, and now they have nothing to do but to sit and 
swallow the food he gives. They are to pay his salary, and 
attend on his preaching, and they think that is doing a great 
deal. And he on his part is expected to preach good, sound, 
comfortable doctrine, to bolster them up, and make them feel 
comfortable, and so they expect to go to heaven. I tell you, 
THEY WILL GO TO HELL, if this is their religion. 
That is not the way to heaven. 

Rest assured that where this spirit prevails in the church, 
however good the minister may be, the church have taken 
the course to prevent a revival. If he is ever so faithful, 
ever so much engaged, ever so talented and eloquent, he 
may wear himself oufc, and perhaps destroy his life, but he 
will have little or no revival. 

"Where there is no church, or very few members in the 
church, a revival may be promoted without any organized 
effort of the church, because it is not there, and in such a 
case, God accommodates his grace to the circumstances, as 
he did when the apostles went out, single-handed, to plant 
the Gospel in the world. I have seen instances of powerful 
revivals where such was the case. But where there are means, 
God will have them used. I had rather have no church in a 
place, than attempt to promote a revival in a place where 
there is a church which will not work. God will be inquired 
of by his people to bestow blessings. The counteracting in- 
fluence of a church that will not work is worse than infidelity. 
There is no possibility of occupying neutral ground, in re- 
gard to a revival, though some professors imagine they are 
neutral. If a professor will not lay himself out in the work, 
he opposes it. Let such a one attempt to take middle ground, 
and say he is going to wait and see how they come out — 
why, that is the very ground the devil wants him to 
take. Professors can in this way do his work a great deal 
more effectually than by open opposition. If they take 



HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 215 

open ground in opposition, everybody will say they have no 
religion. But by this middle course they retain their influ- 
ence, and thus do the devil's work more effectually. 

In employing a minister, a church must remember that 
they have only employed a leader to lead them on to action 
in the cause of Christ. / People would think it strange if any- 
body should propose Ao support a general and then let him 
go and fight alone ! /This is no more absurd, or destructive, 
than for a minister to attempt to go forward alone. The 
church misconceive the design of the ministry, if they leave 
their minister to work alone. It is not enough that they 
should hear the sermons. That is only the word of com- 
mand, which the church are bound to follow. 

2. Do not complain of your minister because there is no re- 
vival, if you are not doing your duty. It is of no use to com- 
plain of there being no revival, if you are not doing your 
duty. That alone is a sufficient reason why there should be 
no revival. It is a most cruel and abominable thing for a 
church to complain of their minister, when they themselves 
are fast asleep. It is very common for professors of religion 
to take great credit to themselves, and quiet their own con- 
sciences by complaining of their ministers. And when the 
importance of ministers being awake is spoken of, this sort 
of people are ready to say, We never shall have a revival 
with such a minister, when the fact is that their minister is 
much more awake than they are themselves. 

Another thing is true in regard to this point, and worthy 
of notice. When the church is sunk down in a low state, 
professors of religion are very apt to complain of the church, 
and of the low state of religion among them. |/That intan- 
gible and irresponsible being, the " church," is greatly com- 
plained of by them, for being asleep. Then complaints of 
the low state of religion, and of the coldness of the church or 
of the minister, are poured out dolefully, without their seeming 
to realize that the church is composed of individuals, and that 
until each one will take his own case in hand, complain of 
himself, and humble himself before God, and repent, and 
wake up, the church can never have any efficiency, and there 
never can be a revival. If instead of complaining of your 
minister, or of the church, you would wake up as individuals, 
and not complain of him or them until you can say you are 
pure from the blood of all men, and are doing your duty to 
save sinners, he would be apt to feel the justice of your com- 
plaints, and if he would not, God would, and would either 
wake hini up or remove him. 



216 HOW CHUKCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

3. Do not let your minister kill himself by attempting to 
carry on the work alone, while you refuse to help him. V! It some- 
times happens that a minister finds the ark of the Lord will not 
move unless he lays out his utmost strength, and he has been 
so desirous of a revival that he has done this, and has died. 
And he was willing to die for it. I could mention some cases 
in this State, where ministers have died, and no doubt in con- 
sequence of their labors to promote a revival where the church 
hung back from the work. 

I will mention one case. A minister, some years since, was 
laboring where there was a revival ; and was visited by an el- 
der of a church at some distance who wanted him to go and 
preach there. There was no revival there, and never had 
been, and the elder complained about their state, said they 
had had two excellent ministers, one had worn himself com- 
pletely out and died, and the other had exhausted himself, and 
got discouraged, and left them, and they were a poor and fee- 
ble church, and their prospects very dark unless they could 
have a revival, and so he begged this minister to go and help 
them. He seemed to be very sorrowful, and the minister 
heard his whining, and at last replied by asking, Why did 
you never have a revival ? I don't know said the elder. Our 
minister labored hard, but the church did not seem to wake 
up, and somehow there seemed to be no revival. "Well, 
now," said the minister, "I see what you want ; you have kill- 
ed one of God's ministers, and broken down another so that 
he had to leave you, and now you want to get another there 
and kill him, and the devil has sent you here to get me to go 
and rock your cradle for you. You had one good minister to 
preach to you, but you slept on, and he exerted himself till he 
absolutely died in the work. Then the Lord let you have an- 
other, and still you lay and slept, and would not wake up to 
your duty. And now you have come here in despair, and want 
another minister, do you ? God forbid that you should ever 
have another while you do as you have done. God forbid that 
you should ever have a minister, till the church will wake up 
to duty." The elder was affected, for he was a good man. The 
tears came in his eyes, and he said it was no more than they 
deserved. "And now," said the minister, " will you be faithful, 
and go home and tell the church what I say ? If you will, and 
they will be faitliful and wake up to duty, they shall have a 
minister, I will warrant them that." The elder said he would, 
and he was true to his word ; he went home and told the 
church how cruel it was for them to ask another minister to 
come among them, unless they would wake up. They felt it, 



HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 217 

and confessed their sins, and waked up to duty, and a minister 
was sent to them, and a precious and powerful revival followed. 

Churches do not realize how often their coldness and back- 
wardness may be absolutely the cause of the death of ministers. 
The state of the people, and of sinners, rests upon their 
mind, they travail in soul night and day, and they labor in 
season and out of season, beyond the power of the human 
constitution to bear, till they wear out and die. The church 
know not the agony of a minister's heart, when he travails 
for souls, and labors to wake up the church to help, and still 
sees them in the slumbers of death. Perhaps sometimes they 
will rouse up to spasmodic effort for a few days, and then all 
is cold again. And so many a faithful minister wears himself 
out and dies, and then these heartless professors are the first 
to blame him for doing so much. 

I recollect a case of a good minister, who went to a place 
where there was a revival, and while there heard a pointed 
sermon to ministers. He received it like a man of God ; 
he did not rebel against God's truth, but he vowed to God 
that he never would rest until he saw a revival among his 
people. He returned home and went to work ; the church 
would not wake up, except a few members, and the Lord 
blessed them, and poured out his Spirit, but the minister 
laid himself down on his bed and died, in the midst of the 
revival. 

4. Be careful not to complain of plain, pointed preaching, 
even when its reproofs fasten on yourselves. Churches arje apt 
to forget that a minister is responsible only to God. 4 They 
want to make rules for a minister to preach by, so as not to 
have it fit them. If he bears down on the church, and ex- 
poses the sins that prevail among them, they call it personal, 
and rebel against the truth. Or they say, he should not 
preach so plainly to the church before the world ; it exposes 
religion, they say, and he ought to take them by themselves 
and preach to the church alone, and not tell sinners how bad 
Christians are. But there are cases where a minister can do 
no less than to show the house of Jacob their sins. <Ef you 
ask, Why not do it when we are by ourselves ? I answer, Just 
as if sinners did not know you did wrong. I will preach to 
you by yourselves, about your own sins, when you will get to- 
gether by yourselves to sin. But as the Lord liveth, if you 
sin before the world, you shall be rebuked before the worldX 
Is it not a fact that sinners do know how you live, and that 
they stumble over you into hell ? Then do not blame min- 
isters, wh«n they see it their duty to rebuke the church 
10 



218 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

openly before the world. If you are so proud you cannot 
bear this, you need not expect a revival. Do not call preach- 
ing too plain because it exposes the faults of the church. 
There is no such thing as preaching too plain. 

5. Sometimes professors take alarm, lest the minister 
should offend the ungodly by plain preaching. And they will 
begin to caution him against it, and ask him if he had not 
better alter a little to avoid giving offence, and the like. This 
fear is excited especially if some of the more wealthy and in- 
fluential members of the congregation are offended, lest they 
should withdraw their support from the church, and no 
longer give their money to help to pay the minister's salary, 
and so the burden will come the heavier on the church. 
They never can have a revival in such a church. Why, the 
church ought to pray, above all things, that the truth may 
come on the ungodly like fire. What if they are offended ? 
Christ can get along very well without their money. Do 
not blame your minister, nor ask him to change his mode 
of preaching to please and conciliate the ungodly. It is of 
no use for a minister to preach to the impenitent, unless he 
can preach the truth to them. And it will do no good for 
them to pay for the support of the Gospel, unless it is 
preached in such a way that they may be searched and 
saved. 

Sometimes church members will talk among themselves 
about the minister's imprudence, and create a party, and get 
into a very wrong spirit, because the wicked are displeased. 
There was a place where there was a powerful revival, and 
great opposition. The church were alarmed, for fear that if 
the minister was not less plain and pointed, some of the im- 
penitent would go and join some other congregation. And 
one of the leading men in the church was appointed to go to 
the minister and ask him not to preach quite so hard, for if 
he continued to do so, such and such persons would leave the 
congregation. The minister asked, Is not the preaching 
true? "Yes." Does not God bless it? "Yes." Did you 
ever see the like of this work before in this place ? " No, I 
never did." "Get thee behind me, Satan, the devil has 
sent you here on this errand ; you see God is blessing the 
preaching, the work is going on, and sinners are converted 
every day, and now you come to get me to let down the tone 
of preaching, so as to ease the minds of the ungodly." The 
man felt the rebuke, and took it like a Christian ; he saw his 
error and submitted, and never again was heard to find fault 
with the plainness of preaching. 



HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 219 

In another town, where there was a revival, a woman who 
had some influence (not pious), complained very much about 
plain, pointed, personal preaching, as she called it. But by 
and by she herself became a subject of the work. After this 
some of her impenitent friends reminded her of what she 
used to say against the preacher for "preaching it out so 
hot." She now said her views were altered, and she did not 
care how hot the truth was preached, if it was red hot. 

6. Do not take part with the xoicked in any way. If you do 
it at all, you will strengthen their hands. If the wicked ac- 
cuse the minister of being imprudent, or of being personal, 
and if the church members, without admitting that the minis- / 
ter does so, only admit that personal preaching is wrong,/ 
and talk about the impropriety of personal preaching, the 
wicked will feel themselves strengthened by such remarks. 
Do not unite with them at all, for they will feel that they 
have you on their side against their minister. You adopt 
their principles, and use their language, and are understood 

as sympathizing with them. What is personal preaching ? 
No individual is ever benefited by preaching unless he is 
made to feel that it means him. Now such preaching is al- 
ways personal. It often appears so personal, to wicked men, 
that they feel as if they were just going to be called out 
by name before the congregation. A minister was once 
preaching to a congregation, and when describing certain 
characters, he said, "If I was omniscient, I could call out 
by name the very persons that answer to this picture." A 
man cried out, "Name me!" and he looked as if he was 
going to sink into the earth. He afterwards said that he had 
no idea of speaking out, but the minister described him so 
perfectly, that he really thought he was going to call him by 
name. The minister did not know there was such a man in 
the world. It is common for men to think their own con- 
duct is described, and they complain, " Who has been telling 
him about me ? Somebody has been talking to him about 
me, and getting him to preach at me." I suppose I have 
heard of five hundred or a thousand just such cases. Now if 
the church members will just admit that it is wrong for a 
minister to mean anybody in his preaching, how can he do 
any good. If you are not willing your minister should mean 
anybody, or preach to anybody, you had better dismiss him. 
Whom must he preach to, if not to the persons, the individ- 
uals before him? And how can he preach to them, when he 
does not mean them ? 

7. If you wish to stand by your minister in promoting a 



220 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

revival, do not by your lives contradict his preaching. If he 
preaches that sinners are going to hell, do not give the lie to 
it, and smile it all away, by your levity and unconcern. I 
have heard sinners speak of the effect produced on their 
minds by levity in Christians, after a solemn and searching 
discourse. They feel solemn and tender, and begin to be 
alarmed at then' condition, and they see these professors, in- 
stead of weeping over them, all light and easy, as much as to 
say, " Do not be afraid, sinners, it is not so bad, after all ; 
keep cool and you will do well ; do you think we would laugh 
and joke if you were going to hell so fast ? We should not 
laugh if only your house was on fire, still less if we saw you 
burning in it." Of what use is it for a minister to preach to 
sinners in such a state of things ? 

8. Do not needlessly take up the time of your minister. 
Ministers often lose a great deal of time by individuals call- 
ing on them to talk, when they have nothing of importance 
to talk about, and no particular errand. The minister of 
course is glad to see his friends, and often too willing to 
spend time in conversation with his people, as he loves 
and esteems them. Professors of religion should remember 
that a minister's time is worth more than gold, for it can be 
employed in that which gold can never buy. If the minister 
is kept from his knees, or from his Bible, or his study, that 
they may indulge themselves in his conversation, they do a 
great injury. When you have a good reason for it, you should 
never be backward to call on him, and even take up all the 
time that is necessary. But if you have nothing in particular 
to say that is important, keep away. I knew a man in one 
of our cities, who was out of business, and he used to take 
up months of the minister's time. He would come to his 
study, and sit for three hours at a time, and talk, because he 
had nothing else to do, till finally, the minister had to rebuke 
him plainly, and tell him how much sin he was committing. 

9. Be sure not to sanction anything that is calculated to 
divert public attention from the subject of religion. Often 
when it comes the time of year to work, when the evenings 
are long, and business is light, and the very time to make an 
extra effort, at this moment, somebody in the church will give 
a party, and invite some Christian friends, so as to have it a 
religious party. And then some other family must do the 
same, to return the compliment. Then another and another, 
till it grows into an organized system of parties, that con- 
sume the whole winter. Abominable! This is the grand 
device of the devil, because it appears so innocent, and so 



HOW CHURCHES CAN nELP MINISTERS. 221 

proper, to promote good feeling, and increase the acquaintance 
of Christians with each other. And so, instead of prayer 
meetings they will have these parties. 

The evils of these parties are very great. They are often 
got up at great expense, and the most abominable gluttony is 
practised in them. It is said that the expense is from one 
hundred to two thousand dollars. I have been told that in 
some instances, professed Christians have given great parties, 
and made great entertainments, and excused their ungodly 
prodigality in the use of Jesus Christ's money, by giving what 
was left, after the feast was ended, to the poor ! Thus making 
it a virtue to feast and riot, even to surfeiting, on the bounties 
of God's providence, under pretence of benefiting the poor. 
This is the same in principle, with a splendid ball which was 
given some years since, in a neighboring city. The ball was 
got up for the benefit of the poor, and each gentleman was 
to pay a certain sum, and after the ball was ended, whatever 
remained of the funds thus raised, was to be given to the 
poor. Truly this is strange charity, to eat and drink and 
dance, and when they have rioted and feasted until they can 
enjoy it no longer, they deal out to the poor the crumbs that 
have fallen from the table. I do not see why such a ball is 
not quite as pious as such Christian parties. The evil of 
balls does not consist simply in the exercise of dancing, but 
in the dissipation, and surfeiting, and temptations connected 
with them. 

But it is said they are Christian parties, and that they are 
all, or nearly all, professors of religion who attend them. 
And furthermore, that they are concluded, often, with 
prayer. Now I regard this as one of the worst features 
about them ; that after the waste of time and money, the 
excess in eating and drinking, the vain conversation, and 
nameless fooleries, with which such a season is filled up, an 
attempt should be made to sanctify it, and palm it off upon 
God, by concluding it with prayer. Say what you will, it 
would not be more absurd or incongruous, or impious, to 
close a ball, or a theatre, or a card party with prayer. 

Has it come to this, that professors of religion, professing 
to desire the salvation of the world, when such calls are 
made upon them, from the four winds of heaven, to send the 
Gospel, to furnish Bibles, and tracts, and missionaries, to 
save the world from death, that they should spend hundreds 
of dollars in an evening, and then go to the monthly concert 
and pray for the heathen ! 

In some instances, I have been told, they find a salvo for 



222 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

their consciences, in the fact that their minister attends their 
parties. This, of course, would give weight to such an exam- 
ple, and if one professor of religion made a party and invited 
their minister, others must do the same. The next step they 
take may be for each to give a ball, and appoint their minis- 
ter a manager ! Why not ? And perhaps, by and by, he 
will do them the favor to play the fiddle. In my estimation 
he might quite as well do it, as to go and conclude such a 
party with prayer. 

I have heard with pain, that a circle of parties, I know not 
to what extent, has been held in Rochester — that place so 
highly favored of the Lord. I know not through whose influ- 
ence they have been got up, or by what particular persons they 
have been patronized and attended. But I should advise any 
congregation who are calculating to have a circle of parties, 
in the mean time to dismiss their minister, and let him go 
and preach where the people would be ready to receive the 
word and profit by it, and not have hrm stay and be dis- 
tressed, and grieved, and killed, by attempting to promote 
religion among them, while they are engaged heart and hand 
in the service of the devil. 

Professors of religion should never get up anything that 
may divert public attention from religion, without first having 
consulted their minister, and made it a subject of special 
prayer. And if they find it will have this effect, they ought 
never to do it. Subjects will often come up before the public 
which have this tendency ; some course of lectures, or show, 
or the like. Professors ought to be wise, and understand 
what they are about, and not give countenance to any such 
thing, until they see what influence it will have, and whether 
it will hinder a revival. If it will do that, let them have 
nothing to do with it. Every such thing should be estimated 
by its bearing upon Christ's kingdom. 

In relation to parties, say what you please about their being 
an innocent recreation, I appeal to any of you who have ever 
attended them, to say whether they fit you for prayer, or in- 
crease your spirituality, or whether sinners are ever converted 
in them, or Christians made to agonize in prayer for souls ? 

II. I am to mention several things which churches must 
DO, if they would promote a revival and aid their minister. 

1. They must attend to his temporal wants. A minister, 
who gives himself wholly to the work, cannot be engaged in 
worldly employments, and of course is entirely dependent on 
his people for the supply of his temporal wants, including the 
support of his family. I need not argue this point here, for 



HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 223 

you all understand this perfectly. It is the command of God, 
that " they which preach the Gospel should live of the Gos- 
pel." But now look around and see how many churches do 
in this matter. For instance, when they want a minister, 
they will cast about and see how cheap they can get one. 
They will calculate to a farthing how much his salt will cost, 
and how much his meal, and then set his salary so low as to 
subject him to extreme inconvenience to get along and keep 
his family. A minister must have his mind at ease, to study 
and labor with effect, and he cannot screw down prices, and 
banter, and look out for the best chances to buy to advan- 
tage what he needs. If he is obliged to do this, his mind is 
embarrassed. Unless his temporal wants are so supplied, 
that his thoughts may be abstracted from them, how can he 
do his duty? 

2. Be honest with your minister. 

Do not measure out and calculate with how much salt and 
how many bushels of grain he can possibly get along. Ee- 
member, you are dealing with Chrisi And he calls you to 
place his ministers in such a situation that with ordinary pru- 
dence temporal embarrassment is out of the question. 

3. Be punctual with him. 

Sometimes churches, when they are about settling a min- 
ister, have a great deal of pride about giving a salary, and 
they will get up a subscription, and make out an amount 
which they never pay, and very likely never expected to pay. 
And so, after one, two, three or four years, the society gets 
three or four hundred dollars in arrears to their minister, and 
then they expect he will give it to them. And all the while 
they wonder why there is no revival ! This may be the very 
reason, because the church have LIED ; they have faithfully 
promised to pay so much, and have not done it. God cannot 
consistently pour out his Spirit on such a church. 

4. Pay him his salary without asking. 

Nothing is so embarrassing, often, to a minister as to be 
obliged to dun his people for his salary. Often he gets ene- 
mies, and gives offence, by being obliged to call, and call, and 
call for his money, and then not get it as they promised. 
They would have paid it if their credit had been at stake, but 
when it is nothing but conscience and the blessing of God, 
they let it lie along. If any one of them had a note at the 
bank, you would see him careful and prompt to be on the 
ground before three o'clock. That is because the note will 
be protested^ and they shall lose their character. But they 
know the minister will not sue them for his salary, and they 



224 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

are careless and let it run along, and he must suffer the in- 
convenience. This is not so common in the city as it is in 
the country. But in the country, I have known some heart- 
rending cases of distress and misery, by the negligence and 
cruelty of congregations in withholding that which is due. 
Churches live in habitual lying and cheating, and then 
wonder why they have no revival How can they wonder ? 

5. Pray for your minister. 

I mean something by this. And what do you suppose I 
mean ? Even the apostles used to urge the churches to pray 
for them. This is more important than you* imagine. Min- 
isters do not ask people to pray for them simply as men, nor 
that they may be filled with an abundance of the Spirit's in- 
fluences, merely to promote their personal enjoyment. But 
they know that unless the church greatly desires a blessing 
upon the labors of a minister, it is tempting God for him 
to expect it. How often does a minister go into his pulpit, 
feeling that his heart is ready to break for the blessing of 
God, while he also feels that there is no room to expect it, for 
there is no reason to believe the church desire it ! Perhaps 
he has been two hours on his knees in supplication,- and yet 
because that the church do not desire a blessing, he feels as 
if his words would bound back in his face. 

I have seen Christians who would be in an agony, when the 
minister was going into the pulpit, for fear his mind should 
be in a cloud, or his heart cold, or he should have no unction, 
and so a blessing should not come. I have labored with a 
man of this sort. He would pray until he got an assurance 
in his mind that God would be with me in preaching, and 
sometimes he would pray himself sick. I have known the 
time, when he has been in darkness for a season, while the 
people were gathering, and his mind was full of anxiety, and 
he would go again and again to pray, till finally he would 
come into the room with a placid face, and say, " The Lord 
has come, and he will be with us." And I do not know that 
I ever found him mistaken. 

I have known a church bear their minister on their arms in 
prayer from day to day, and watch with anxiety unutterable, 
to see that he has the Holy Ghost with him in his labors 1 
"When they feel and pray thus, oh, what feelings and what 
looks are manifest in the congregation! They have felt 
anxiety unutterable to have the word come with power, and 
take effect, and when they see their prayer answered, and 
they hear a word or a sentence come WARM from the heart, 
and taking effect among the people, you can see their whole 



HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 225 

souls look out of their eyes. How different is the case, where 
the church feel that the minister is praying, and so there is no 
need of their praying ! They are mistaken. The church 
must desire and pray for the blessing. God says he will be 
inquired of by the house of Israel. I wish you to feel that 
there can be no substitute for this. 

I have seen cases in revivals, where the church was kept in 
the back ground in regard to prayer, and persons from abroad 
were called on to pray in all the meetings. This is always 
unhappy, even if there should be a revival, for the revival 
must be less powerful and less salutary in its influences upon 
the church. I do not know but I have sometimes offended 
Christians and ministers from abroad, by continuing to call 
on members of the church in the place to pray, and not on 
those from abroad. It was not from any disrespect to them, 
but because the object was to get that church which was 
chiefly concerned, to desire, and pray, and agonize for a 
blessing. 

In a certain place, a protracted meeting was held, with no 
good results, and great evils produced. I was led to make 
inquiry for the reason. And it came out, that in all their meet- 
ings, not one member of their own church was called on to 
pray, but all the prayers were made by persons from abroad. 
No wonder there was no good done. The church was not 
interested. The leader of the meeting meant well, but he 
undertook to promote a revival without getting the church 
there into the work. He let a lazy church he still and do 
nothing, and so there could be no good. 

Churches should pray for ministers as the agents of break- 
ing down sinners with the word of truth. Prayer for a min- 
ister is often done in a set and formal way, and confined to 
the prayer meetings. They will say their prayers in the old 
way, as they have always done : " Lord, bless thy ministering 
servant, whom thou hast stationed on this part of Zion's walls, " 
and so on, and it amounts to nothing, because there is no 
heart in it. And the proof often is, that they never thought 
of praying for him in secret, they never have agonized in then* 
closets for a blessing on his labors. They may not omit it 
wholly in their meetings. If they do that, it is evident that 
they care very little indeed about the labors of their minister. 
But that is not the most important place. The way to present 
effectual prayer for your minister is to take it to your closet, 
and when you are in secret, wrestle with God for success to 
attend his labors. 

I knew a case of a minister in ill health, who became de- 
10* 



226 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

pressed and sunk down in his mind, and was very much in 
darkness, so that he did not feel as if he could preach any 
longer. An individual of the church was waked up to feel 
for the minister's situation, and to pray that he might have 
the Holy Ghost to attend his preaching. One Sabbath morn- 
ing, this person's mind was very much exercised, and he be- 
gan to pray as soon as it was light, and prayed again and 
again for a blessing that day. And the Lord in some way 
directed the minister within hearing of his prayer. The per- 
son was telling the Lord just what he thought of the minis- 
ter's situation and state of mind, and pleading, as if he would 
not be denied, for a blessing. The minister went into* the 
pulpit and preached, and the light broke in upon him, and 
the word was with power, and a revival commenced that very 
day. 

6. A minister should be provided for by the church, and his 
support guarranteed, irrespective of the ungodly. Otherwise 
he may be obliged either to starve his family, or to keep back 
a part of the truth so as to not offend sinners. I once expos- 
tulated with a minister who I found was afraid to come out 
fully with the truth. I told him I was surprised he did not 
bear down on certain points. He told me he was so situated 
that he must please certain men, who would be touched there. 
It was the ungodly that chiefly supported him, and that made 
him dependent and temporizing. And yet perhaps that very 
church which left their minister dependent on the ungodly 
for his bread, will turn round and abuse him for his want of 
faith, and his fear of men. The church ought always to say 
to their minister, " We will support you ; go to work ; let 
the truth pour down on the people, and we will stand by you." 

7. See that everything is so arranged, that people can sit 
comfortably in meeting. If people do not sit easy, it is difficult 
to get or to keep their attention. And if they are not attentive, 
they can not be converted. They have come to hear for their 
lives, and they ought to be so situated that they can hear with 
all their souls, and have nothing in their bodily position to call 
for attention. Churches do not realize how important it is 
that the place of meeting should be made comfortable. I do 
not mean showy. All your glare and glory of rich chandeliers, 
and rich carpets, and splendid pulpits, is the opposite extreme, 
and takes off the attention just as badly, and defeats every 
object for which a sinner should come to meeting. You need 
not expect a revival there. 

8. See that the house of God is kept cleanly. The house of 
God should be kept as clean as you would want your own 



HOW CHTTKCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 227 

house to be kept. Churches are often kept excessively slovenly. 
I have seen them, where people used so much tobacco, and 
took so little care about neatness, that it was impossible to 
preach with comfort. Once in a protracted meeting, the 
thing was charged upon the church, and they had to acknowl- 
edge it, that they paid more money for tobacco than they did 
for the cause of missions. They could not kneel in their pews, 
and ladies could not sit without all the time watching their 
clothes, and they had to be careful where they stepped, be- 
cause the house was so dirty, and there was so much tobacco 
juice running all about the floor. If people cannot go where 
they can hear without being annoyed with offensive sights and 
smells, and where they can kneel in prayer, what good will a 
protracted meeting do? There is an importance in these 
things, which is not realized. See that man ! What is he 
doing ? I am preaching to him about eternal life, and he is 
thmking about the dirty pew. And that woman is asking for 
a footstool to keep her feet out of the tobacco juice. Shame ! 

9. It is important that the house should be just warm enough, 
and not too warm. Suppose a minister comes into a house, and 
finds it cold ; he sees as soon as he gets in, that he might as well 
have staid at home ; the people are shivering, their feet cold, 
they feel as if they should take cold, they are uneasy, and he 
wishes he was at home, for he knows he cannot do anything, 
but he must preach, or they will be disappointed. 

Or he may find the house too warm, and the people, instead 
of listening to the truth, are fanning, and panting for breath, 
and by and by a woman faints, and makes a stir, and the train 
of thought and feeling is all lost, and so a whole sermon is 
wasted to no good end. These little things take off the atten- 
tion of people from the words of eternal life. And very often 
it is so, that if you drop a single link in the chain of argument, 
you lose the whole, and the people are damned, just because 
the careless church do not see to the proper regulation of 
these little matters. 

10. The house should be well ventilated. Of all houses, a 
church should be the most perfectly ventilated. If there is no 
change of the air, it passes through so many lungs it becomes 
bad, and its vitality is exhausted, and the people pant, they 
know not why, and feel an almost irresistible desire to sleep, 
and the minister preaches in vain. The sermon is lost, and 
worse than lost. I have often wondered that this matter should 
be so little the subject of thought. The elders and trustees 
will sit and hear a whole sermon, while the people are all but 
ready to die for the want of air, and the minister is wasting 



228 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

Ms strength in preaching where the room is just like an ex- 
hausted receiver, and there they sit and never think to do any- 
thing to help the matter. They should take it upon them- 
selves to see that this is regulated right, that the house is just 
warm enough, and the air kept pure. How important it is 
that the church should be awake to this subject, that the min- 
ister may labor to the best advantage, and the people give 
their undivided attention to the truth, which is to save their 
souls. 

It is very common, when things are wrong, to have it all 
laid to the sexton. This is not so. Often the sexton is not 
to blame. If the house is cold and uncomfortable, very often 
it is because the fuel is not good, or the stoves not suitable, 
or the house is so open it cannot be warmed. If it is too 
warm, perhaps somebody has intermeddled when he was out, 
and heaped on fuel without discretion. Or, if the sexton is in 
fault, perhaps it is because the church do not pay him enough 
for his services, and he cannot afford to give the attention 
necessary to keep the church in order. Churches sometimes 
screw down the sexton's salary, to the lowest point, so that 
he is obliged to slight his work. Or they will select one who 
is incompetent, for the sake of getting him cheap, and then 
the thing is not done. The fault is in the church. Let them 
give an adequate compensation for the work, and it can be 
done, and done faithfully. If one sexton will not do right, 
another will, and the church are bound to see it done right, 
or else let them dismiss their minister, and not keep him, and 
at the same time have other things in a state so out of order 
that he loses all his work. What economy ! To pay the min- 
ister's salary, and then for the want of fifty dollars added to 
the sexton's wages, everything is so out of order that the min- 
ister's labors are all lost, souls are lost, and your children and 
neighbors go down to hell ! 

Sometimes this uncleanliness, and negligence, and confusion 
are chargeable to the minister. Perhaps he uses tobacco, and 
sets the example of defiling the house of God. Perhaps the 
pulpit will be the filthiest place in the house. I have some- 
times been in pulpits that were too loathesome to be occupied 
by human beings. If a minister has no more piety and de- 
cency than this, no wonder things are at loose ends in the 
congregation. And generally it is even so. 

11. People should leave their dogs, and very young child- 
ren at home. I have often known contentions arise among 
dogs, and children to cry, just at that stage of the services, 
that would most effectually destroy the effect of the meeting. 



HOW CHUECHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 229 

If children are present and weep, they should instantly be re- 
moved. I have sometimes known a mother or a nurse sit and 
toss her child, while its cries were diverting the attention of 
the whole congregation. This is cruel. And as for dogs, they 
had infinitely better be dead, than to divert attention from the 
word of God. See that deacon ; perhaps his dog has in this 
way destroyed more souls than the deacon will ever be instru- 
mental in saving. 

12. The members of the church should aid the minister by 
visiting from house to house, and trying to save souls. Do not 
leave all this to the minister. It is impossible he should do 
it, even if he gives all his time, and neglects his study and his 
closet. Church members should take pains and qualify them- 
selves for this duty, so that they can be useful in it. 

13. They should hold Bible classes. Suitable individuals 
should be selected to hold Bible classes, for the instruction of 
the young people, and where those who are awakened or 
affected by the preaching, can be received and be converted. 
As soon as any one is seen to be touched, let them be in- 
vited to join the Bible class, where they will be properly 
treated, and probably they will be converted. The church 
should select the best men for this service, and should all be 
on the look out to fill up the Bible classes. It has been done 
in this congregation, and it is a very common thing, when 
persons are impressed, that they are observed by somebody, 
and invited to join the Bible class, and they will do it, and 
there they are converted. I do not mean that we are doing 
all we ought to do in this way, or all we might do. We want 
more teachers, able and willing to take charge of such classes. 

14. Churches should sustain Sabbath schools, and in this 
way aid their ministers in saving souls. How can a minister 
attend to this and preach ? Unless the church will take off 
these responsibilities, and cares, and labors, he must either 
neglect them, or be crushed. Let the church be WIDE 
AWAKE, watch and bring in children to the school, and 
teach them faithfully, and lay themselves out to promote a 
revival in the school. • 

15. They should ivatch over the members of the church. 
They should visit each other, in order to stir each other up, 
know each other's spiritual state, and provoke one another to 
love and good works. The minister cannot do it, he has not 
time ; it is impossible he should study and prepare sermons, 
and at the same time visit every member of the church as 
often as it needs to be done to keep them advancing. The 
church are bound to do it. They are under oath to 



230 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

watch over each other's spiritual welfare. But how is this 
done ? Many do not know each other. They meet and pass 
each other as strangers, and never ask about their spiritual 
condition. But if they hear anything bad of one, they go 
and tell it to others. Instead of watching over each other 
for their good, they watch for their halting. How can they 
watch for good when they are not even acquainted with each 
other ? 

16. The church should watch for the effect of 'preaching. If 
they are praying for the success of the preached word, they 
will watch for it of course. They should keep a look out, 
and when any in the congregation give evidence that the 
word of God has taken hold of them, they should follow it 
up. "Wherever there are any exhibitions of feeling, those 
persons should be attended to instantly, and not left till their 
impressions wear off. They should talk to them, or get them 
visited, or get them into the anxious meeting, or into the 
Bible class, or bring them to the minister. If the members 
of the church do not attend to this, they neglect their duty. 
If they attend to it, they may do incalculable good. 

There was a pious young woman who lived in a very cold 
and wicked place. She alone had the spirit of prayer, and 
she had been praying for a blessing upon the word. At 
length she saw one individual in the congregation who seemed 
to be affected by the preaching, and as soon as the minister 
came from the pulpit, she came forward, agitated and trem- 
bling, and begged him to go and converse with the person 
immediately. He did so, and the individual was soon con- 
verted, and a revival followed. Now one of your stupid pro- 
fessors would not have seen that individual awakened, and 
would have stumbled over half a dozen of them without no- 
tice, and let them go to hell. Professors should watch every 
sermon, and see how it affects the congregation. I do not 
mean that they should be stretching their necks and staring 
about the house, but they should observe, as they may, and 
if they find any person affected by preaching, throw them- 
selves in his way, and guide him to the Saviour. 

17. Beware and not give away all the preaching to others. 
If you do not take your portion, you will starve, and become 
like spiritual skeletons. Christians should take their portion 
to themselves. If the word should be quite searching to 
them, they should make the honest application, and lay it 
along side their heart and practise it, and live by it. Other- 
wise preaching will do them no good. 

18. Be ready to aid your minister in effecting his plans for 



HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 231 

doing good. When the minister is wise to devise plans for 
usefulness, and the church ready to execute them, they may 
carry all before them. But when the church hang back from 
every enterprise until they are actually dragged into it, when 
they are opposing every proposal, because it will cost some- 
thing, they are a dead weight upon a minister. If stoves are 
needed, oh, no, they will cost something. If lamps are called 
for, to prevent preaching in the dark, oh, no, they will cost 
something. And so they will stick up candles on the posts, 
or do without evening meetings altogether. If they stick up 
candles, it soon comes to pass that they either give no light, 
or some one must run round and snuff them. And so the 
whole congregation are disturbed by the candle-snuffer, their 
attention taken off, and the sermon lost. 

I was once attending a protracted meeting, where we were 
embarrassed because there were no lamps to the house. I 
urged the people to get them, but they thought it would cost 
too much. I then proposed to get them myself, and was 
about to do it, but found it would give offence, and we went 
on without. But the blessing did not come, to any great ex- 
tent. How could it ? The church began by calculating to a 
cent how much it would cost, and they would not go beyond, 
to save souls from helL 

So where a minister appoints a meeting, such people cannot 
have it, because it will cost something. If they can offer 
unto the Lord that which costs nothing, they will do it. 
Miserable helpers they are ! Such a church can have no re- 
vival A minister might as well have a millstone about his 
neck as such a cjiurch. He had better leave them, if he can- 
not teach them better, and go where he will not be so 
hamp'ered. 

19. Church members should make it a point to attend prayer 
meetings, and attend in time. Some church members will always 
attend on preaching, because there they have nothing to do, 
but to sit and hear, and be entertained, but they will not at- 
tend prayer meetings, for fear they shall be called on to do 
something. Such members tie up the hands of the minister, 
and discourage his heart. Why do they employ a minister ? 
Is it to amuse them by preaching ? or is it that he may teach 
them the will of God that they may do it ? 

20. Church members ought to study and inquire what they 
can do, and then do it. Christians should be trained like a 
band of soldiers. It is the duty and office of a minister to 
train them for usefulness, to teach them and direct them, and 
lead them on in such a way as to produce the greatest amount 



232 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

of moral influence. And then they should stand their ground 
and do their duty, otherwise they will be right in the way. 

There are many other points which I noted, and intended 
to touch upon, but there is not time. 1 could write a book as 
big as this Bible, in detailing the various particulars that 
ought to be attended to. I must close with a few 



REMARKS. 

1. You see that a minister's want of success may not be 
wholly on account of a want of wisdom in the exercise of his 
office. I am not going to plead for negligent ministers. I 
never will spare ministers from the naked truth, nor apply 
flattering titles to men. If they are blameworthy, let them 
be blamed. And no doubt they are always more or less to 
blame when the word produces no effect. But it is far from 
being true that they are always the principal persons to 
blame. Sometimes the church is much more to blame than 
the minister, and if an apostle or an angel from heaven were 
to preach, he could not produce a revival of religion in that 
church. Perhaps they are dishonest to their minister, or 
covetous, or careless about the conveniences of public wor- 
ship. Alas! what a state many country churches are in, 
where, for the want of a hundred dollars, everything is in- 
convenient and uncomfortable, and the labors of the preacher 
are lost. They live in ceiled houses themselves, and let the 
house of God He waste. Or the church counteract all the in- 
fluence of preaching by their ungodly lives. Or perhaps their 
parties, their worldly show, as in most of the. churches in this 
city, annihilate the influence of the Gospel. 

2. Churches should remember that they are exceedingly 
guilty to employ a minister, and then not aid him in his work. 
The Lord Jesus Christ has sent an ambassador to sinners, to 
turn them from their evil ways, and he fails of his errand, be- 
cause the church Tefuse to do their duty. Instead of recom- 
mending his message, and seconding his entreaties, and hold- 
ing up his hands in all the ways that are proper, they stand 
right in the way, and contradict his message, and counteract 
his influence, and souls perish. No doubt in most of the 
congregations in the United States, the minister is often hin- 
dered so much that he might as well be on a foreign mission 
a great part of the time, as to be there, for any effect of his 
preaching in the conversion of sinners, while he has to preach 
over the heads of an inactive, stupid church. 

And yet these very churches are not willing to have their 



HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 233 

minister absent a few days to attend a protracted meeting. 
"We cannot spare him ; why he is our minister, and we like 
to have our minister here ; " while at the same time they hin- 
der all he can do. If he could, he would tear himself right 
away, and go where there is no minister, and where the 
people would be willing to receive the Gospel. But there he 
must stay, though he cannot get the church into a state to 
have a revival once in three years, to last three months at a 
time. It might be well for him to say to the church, " When- 
ever you are determined to take one of these long naps, I 
wish you to let me know it, so that I can go and labor some- 
where else in the meantime, till you are ready to wake 
again." 

3. Many churches cannot be blessed with a revival, because 
they are spunging out of other churches, and out of the treas- 
ury of the Lord for the support of their minister, when they 
are abundantly able to support him themselves. Perhaps 
they are depending on the Home Missionary Society, or on 
other churches, while they are not exercising any self-denial 
for the sake of the Gospel. I have been amazed to see how 
some churches live. One church that I was acquainted with 
actually confessed that they spent more money for tobacco 
than they gave for missions. And yet they had no minister, 
because they were not able to support one. And they have none 
now. And yet there is one man in that church who is able to 
support a minister. And still they have no minister, and no 
preaching. 

The churches have not been instructed in their duty on this 
subject. I stopped in one place last summer, where there 
was no preaching. I inquired of an elder in the church why 
it was so, and he said it was because they were so poor. I 
asked him how much he was worth. He did not give me a 
direct answer, but said that another elder's income was about 
$5,000 a year, and I finally found out that this man's was 
about the same. Here, said I, are two elders, each of you 
able to support a mi nister, and because you cannot get help 
from abroad, you have no preaching. Why, if you had 
preaching, it would not be blessed, while you were thus 
spunging out of the Lord's treasury. Finally, he confessed 
that he was able to support a minister, and the two together 
agreed that they would do it. 

It is common for churches to ask help, when in fact they 
do not need any help, and when it would be a great deal bet- 
ter for them to support their own minister. If they get funds 
from the Home Missionary Society, when they ought to raise 



234 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

them themselves, they may expect the curse of the Lord upon 
them, and this will be a sufficient reason for the Gospel's 
proving to them a curse rather than a blessing. Of how 
many churches might it be said, " Ye have robbed God, even 
this whole church." 

I know a church who employed a minister but half the 
time, and felt unable to pay his salary for that. A female 
working society in a neighboring town appropriated their 
funds to this object, and assisted this church in paying their 
minister's salary. The result was as might be expected. He 
did them little or no good. They had no revival under his 
preaching, nor could they ever expect any, while acting on 
such a principle. There was one man in that congregation 
who could support a minister all the time. I was informed 
by a member that the church members were supposed to be 
worth two hundred thousand dollars. Now if this is true, 
here is a church with an income, at seven percent., of $14,000 
a year, who felt themselves too poor to pay $200 for support 
of a minister to preach half the time, and would suffer the 
females of a neighboring town to work with their own hands 
to aid them in paying this sum. Among the elders of this 
church, I found that several of them used tobacco, and two 
of them who lived together signed a covenant written on the 
blank leaf of their Bible, in which they pledged themselves to 
abandon that sin for ever. 

It was in a great measure for want of right instruction 
that this church was pursuing such a course. For when the 
subject was taken up, and their duty laid before them, the 
wealthy man of whom I am speaking said that he would pay the 
whole salary himself, if he thought it would not be resented 
by the congregation, and do more hurt than good ; and that 
if the church would procure a minister, and go ahead and 
raise a part of his salary, he would make up the remainder. 
They can now not only support a minister half the time, but 
all the time, and pay his salary themselves. And they will 
find it good and profitable to do so. 

As I have gone from place to place laboring in revivals, I 
have always found that churches were blessed in proportion 
to their liberality. Where they have manifested a disposition 
to support the Gospel, and to pour their substance liberally 
into the treasury of the Lord, they have been blessed both in 
spiritual and in temporal things. But where they have been 
parsimonious, and let the minister preach for them for little 
or nothing, these churches have been cursed instead of 
blessed. And as a general thing, in revivals of religion, I 



HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 235 

have found it to be true that young converts are most in- 
clined to join those churches which are most liberal in mak- 
ing efforts to support the Gospel. 

The churches are very much in the dark on this subject. 
They have not been taught their duty. I have, in many in- 
stances, found an exceeding readiness to do it when the sub- 
ject was laid before them. I knew an elder in a church who 
was talking about getting a minister for half the time, be- 
cause the church were poor, although his own income was 
considerable. I asked him if his income was not sufficient to 
support a minister all the time himself. He said it was. 
And on being asked what other use he could make of the 
Lord's money which he possessed, that would prove so bene- 
ficial to the interests of Christ's kingdom, as to employ a 
minister not only half but all the time in his own town, he 
concluded to set himself about it. A minister has been ac- 
cordingly obtained, and I believe they find no difficulty in 
paying him his full salary. 

The fact is, that a minister can do but little by preaching 
only half the time. If on one Sabbath an impression is 
made, it is lost before a fortnight comes round. As a mat- 
ter of economy, a church should lay themselves out to sup- 
port the Gospel all the time. If they get the right sort of a 
minister, and keep him steadily at work, they may have a re- 
vival, and thus the ungodly will be converted and come in and 
help them. And thus in one year they may have a great ac- 
cession to their strength. But if they employ a minister but 
half the time, year after year may roll away, while sinners 
are going to hell, and no accession is made to their strength 
from the ranks of the ungodly. 

The fact is, that professors of religion have- not been made 
to feel that all their possessions are the Lord's. Hence they 
have talked about giving their property for the support of the 
Gospel. As if the Lord Jesus Christ was a beggar, and they 
called upon to support his Gospel as an act of almsgiving ! 
A merchant in one of the towns in this State, was paying 
a large part of his minister's salary. One of the members 
of the church was relating the fact to a minister from 
abroad, and speaking of the sacrifice which this merchant was 
making. At this moment the merchant came in. " Brother," 
said the minister, " you are a merchant. Suppose you em- 
ploy a clerk to sell goods, and a schoolmaster to teach your 
children. You order your clerk to pay your schoolmaster 
out of the store such an amount, for his services in teaching. 
Now suppose your clerk should give out that he had to pay 



236 HOW CHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 

this schoolmaster his salary, and should speak of the sacri- 
fices that he was making to do it, what would you say to 
this?" "Why," said the merchant, "I should say it w r as 
ridiculous." "Well," says the minister, " God employs you 
to sell goods as his clerk, and your minister he employs to 
teach his children, and requires you to pay his salary out of 
the income of the store. Now, do you call this your sacrifice, 
and say that you are making a great sacrifice, to pay this 
minister's salary ? No, you are just as much bound to sell 
goods for God as he is to preach for God. You have no 
more right to sell goods for the purpose of laying up money, 
than he has to preach the Gospel for the same purpose. You 
are bound to be just as pious, and to aim as singly at the 
glory of God, in selling goods, as he is in preaching the 
Gospel. And thus you are as absolutely to give up your 
whole time for the service of God as he does. You and your 
family may lawfully live out of the avails of the store, and so 
may the minister and his family, just as lawfully. If you sell 
goods from these motives, selling goods is just as much serv- 
ing God as preaching. And a man who sells goods upon 
these principles, and acts in conformity to them, is just as 
pious, just as much in the service of God, as he is who preaches 
the Gospel. Every man is bound to serve God in his calling, 
the minister by teaching, the merchant by selling goods, the 
farmer by tilling his fields, the lawyer and physician by plying 
the duties of their profession. 

" It is equally unlawful for any one of these to labor for 
the meat that perisheth. All they do is to be for God, and 
all they can earn, after comfortably supporting their fami- 
lies, is to be dedicated to the spread of the Gospel and the 
salvation of the world." 

It has long enough been supposed that ministers must be 
more pious than other men, that they must not love the world 3 
that they must labor for God : they must live as frugally as 
possible, and lay out their whole time, and health, and 
strength, and life, to build up the kingdom of Jesus Christ. 
This is true. But although other men are not called to 
labor in the same field, and to give up their time to public 
instruction, yet they are just as absolutely bound to consider 
their whole time as God's, and have no more right to love 
the world; or accumulate wealth, or lay it up for their chil- 
dren, or spend it upon their lusts, than ministers have. 

It is high time the church was acquainted with these prin- 
ciples ; and the Home Missionary Society may labor till the 
day of judgment to convert the people, and they will never 



HOW BHURCHES CAN HELP MINISTERS. 237 

succeed, till the churches are led to understand and feel 
their duty in this respect. Why, the very fact that they are 
asking and receiving aid in supporting their minister from 
the Home Missionary Society while they are able to support 
him themselves, is probably the very reason why his labors 
among them are not more blessed. 

I would that the American Home Missionary Society pos- 
sessed a hundred times the means that it now does, of aid- 
ing feeble churches, that are unable to help themselves. But 
it is neither good economy nor piety to give their funds to 
those who are able but unwilling to support the Gospel. For 
it is in vain to attempt to help them, while they are able but 
unwilling to help themselves. 

If the Missionary Society had a ton of gold, it would be 
no charity to give it to such a church. But let the church 
bring in all the tithes to God's storehouse, and God will open 
the windows of heaven and pour down a blessing. But let 
the churches know assuredly {hat if they are unwilling to 
help themselves to the extent of their ability, they will know 
the reason why such sma]l success attends the labors of their 
ministers. Here they are spunging their support from the 
Lord's treasury. How many churches are laying out their 
money for tea and coffee and tobacco, and then come and 
ask aid from the Home Missionary Society ! I will protest 
against aiding a church who use tea and tobacco, and live 
without the least self-denial, and who want to offer God only 
that which costs nothing. 

Finally. — If they mean to be blessed, let them do their 
duty, do all their duty, put shoulder to the wheel, gird on 
the Gospel armor, and come up to the work. Then, if the 
church is in (ke field, the car of salvation will move on, though 
all hell oppose, and sinners will be converted and saved. But 
if a church will give up all the labor to the minister, and sit 
still and look on, while he is laboring, and themselves do 
nothing but complain of him, they will not only fail of a re- 
vival of religion, but if they continue slothful and censorious, 
will by and by find themselves in hell for their disobedience 
and unprofitableness in the service of Christ. 



LECTUKE XIV. 

MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

Text.— These men, being Jews, do exceedingly trouble our city, and teach cus- 
toms which are not lawful for us to receive, neither to observe, being Romans. — 
Acts xvi. 20, 21. 

" These men," here spoken of, were Paul and Silas, who 
went to Philippi to preach the Gospel, and very much dis- 
turbed the people of that city, because they supposed the 
preaching would interfere with their worldly gains. And so 
they arraigned the preachers of the Gospel before the magis- 
trates of the city, as culprits, and charged them with teach- 
ing doctrines, and especially employing measures, that were 
not lawful. 

In discoursing from these words I design to show, 

I. That under the Gospel dispensation, God has established 
rw particular system of measures to be employed and invariably 
adhered to in promoting religion. 

II. To show that our present forms of public worship, and 
everything, so far as measures are concerned, have been arrived 
at by degrees, and by a succession of New Measures. 

I. I am to show that under the Gospel, God has established 
no particular measures to be used. 

Under the Jewish dispensation, there were particular forms 
enjoined and prescribed by God himself, from which it was 
not lawful to depart. But these forms were all typical, and 
were designed to shadow forth Christ, or something con- 
nected with the new dispensation that Christ was to intro- 
duce. And therefore they were fixed, and all their details 
particularly prescribed by Divine authority. But it was never 
so under the Gospel. When Christ came, the ceremonial or 
typical dispensation was abrogated, because the design of 
those forms was fulfilled, and therefore themselves of no 
further use. He, being the antitype, the types were of course 
done away at his coming. THE GOSPEL was then preached 
as the appointed means of promoting religion ; and it was 
left to the discretion of the church to determine, from time 
to time, what measures shall be adopted, and what forms pur- 
sued, in givingv the Gospel its power. We are left in the 
(238) 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 239 

dark as to the measures which were pursued by the apostles 
and primitive preachers, except so far as we can gather it 
from occasional hints in the book of Acts. We do not know 
how many times they sung and how many times they prayed 
in public worship, nor even whether they sung or prayed at 
all in their ordinary meetings for preaching. When Jesus 
Christ was on earth, laboring among his disciples, he had no- 
thing to do with forms or measures. He did from time to 
time in this respect just as it would be natural for any man 
to do in such cases, without anything like a set form or mode 
of doing it. The Jews accused him of disregarding their 
forms. His object was to preach and teach mankind the 
true religion. And when the apostles preached afterwards, 
with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, we hear nothing 
about their having a particular system of measures to cany- 
on their work, or one apostle doing a thing in a particular 
way because others did it in that way. Their commission 
was, " Go and preach the Gospel, and disciple all nations." 
It did not prescribe any forms. It did not admit any. No 
person can pretend to get any set of forms or particular direc- 
tions as to measures, out of this commission. Do it — the 
best way you can — ask wisdom from God — use the faculties 
he has given you — seek the direction of the Holy Ghost — go 
forward and do it. This was their commission. And their 
object was to make known the Gospel in the most effectual 
way, to make the truth stand out strikingly, so as to obtain 
the attention and secure the obedience of the greatest num- 
ber possible. No person can find any j bnn of doing this 
laid down in the Bible. It is preaching the Gospel that stands 
out prominently there as the great thing. The form is left 
out of the question. 

It is manifest, that, in preaching the Gospel, there must be 
some kind of measures adopted. The Gospel must be gotten 
before the minds of the people, and measures must be taken 
so that they can hear it, and to induce them to attend to it. 
This is done by building churches, holding stated or other 
meetings, and so on. Without some measures, it can never 
be made to take effect among men. 

IL I am to show that our present forms of public worship, 
and everything, so far as measures are concerned, have been 
arrived at by degrees, and by a succession of New Measures. 

1. I will mention some things in regard to the ministry. 

Many years ago, ministers were accustomed to wear a pecu- 
liar habit. It is so now in Catholic countries. It used to be 
so here. Ministers had a peculiar dress as much as soldiers. 



240 MEASUBES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

They Used to wear a cocked hat, and bands instead of a 
cravat or stock, and small clothes, and a wig. No matter 
how much hair a man had on his head, he must cut it off and 
wear a wig. And then he must wear a gown. All these 
things were customary, and every clergyman was held bound 
to wear them, and it was not considered proper for him to 
officiate without them. All these had doubtless been intro- 
duced by a succession of innovations, for we have no good 
reason for believing that the apostles and primitive ministers 
dressed differently from other men. 

But now all these things have been given up, one by one, 
by a succession of innovations or new measures, until now in 
many churches a minister can go into the pulpit and preach 
without being noticed, although dressed like any other man. 
And when it was done in regard to each one of them, the 
church complained as much as if it had been a Divine insti- 
tution given up. It was denounced as an innovation. When 
ministers began to lay aside their cocked hats, and wear hats 
like other men, it grieved the elderly people very much ; it 
looked so " undignified," they said, for a minister to wear a 
round hat. When, in 1827 I wore a fur cap, a minister said, 
"that was too bad for a minister." 

When ministers first began, a few years since, to wear white 
hats, it was thought by many to be a sad and very undignified 
innovation. And even now, they are so bigoted in some 
places, that a clergyman told me but a few days since, in 
travelling through New England last summer with a white 
hat, he could perceive that it injured his influence. This 
spirit should not be looked upon as harmless ; I have good 
reason to know that it is not harmless. Thinking men see it 
to be mere bigotry, and are exceedingly in danger of viewing 
everything about religion in the same light on this account. 
This has been the result in many instances. There is at 
this day scarcely a minister in the land who does not feel 
himself obliged to wear a black coat, as much as if it were a 
divine institution. The church is yet filled with a kind of 
superstitious reverence for such things. This is a great 
stumbling block to many minds. 

So, in like manner, when ministers laid aside their bands, 
and wore cravats or stocks, it was said they were becoming 
secular, and many found fault. Even now, in some places, a 
minister would not dare not be seen in the pulpit in a cravat 
or stock. The people would feel as if they had no clergyman, 
if he had no bands. A minister in this city asked another, 
but a few days since, if it would do to wear a black stock in 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 241 

the pulpit. He wore one in his ordinary intercourse with his 
people, but doubted whether it would do to wear it hi the 
pulpit 

So in regard to short clothes ; they used to be thought 
essential to the ministerial character. Even now, in Catholic 
countries, every priest wears small clothes. Even the little 
boys there, who are training for the priest's office, wear their 
cocked hats, and black stockings, and small clothes. This 
would look ridiculous amongst us. But it used to be prac- 
tised in this country. The time was when good people 
would have been shocked if a minister had gone into the 
pulpit with pantaloons on. They would have thought he was 
certainly going to rain the church by his innovations. I 
have been told that some years ago, in New England, a cer- 
tain elderly clergyman was so opposed to' the new measure 
of a minister's wearing pantaloons, that he would on no ac- 
count allow them in his pulpit. A young man was going to 
preach for him, who had no small clothes, and the old minis- 
ter would not let him officiate in pantaloons. " Why," said 
he, " my people would think I had brought a fop into the pul- 
pit, to see a man there with pantaloons on, and it would produce 
an excitement among them." And so, finally, the young man 
was obliged to borrow a pair of the old gentleman's clothes, 
and they were too short for him, and made a ridiculous figure 
enough. But anything was better than such a terrible inno- 
vation as preaching in pantaloons. But reason has triumphed. 

Just so it was in regard to wigs. I remember one minister, 
who, though quite a young man, used to wear an enormous 
white wig. And the people talked as if there was a divine 
right about it, and it was as hard to give it up, almost, as to 
give up the Bible itself. Gowns also were considered essential 
to the ministerial character. And even now, in many congre- 
gations in this country, the people will not tolerate a minister 
in the pulpit, unless he has a flowing silk gown, with enor- 
mous sleeves as big as his body. Even in some of the Con- 
gregational Churches in New England, they cannot bear to 
give it up. Now, how came people to suppose a minister 
must have a gown or a wig, in order to preach with effect ? 
Why was it that every clergyman was held obliged to use these 
things ? How is it that not one of these things have been 
given up in the churches, without producing a shock among 
them ? They have all been given up, one by one, and many 
congregations have been distracted for a time by the inno- 
vation. But will any one pretend that the cause of religion 
has been injured by it? People felt as if they could hardly 



242 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

worship God without them, but plainly their attachment to 
them was no part of their religion, that is, no part of the 
Christian religion. It was mere superstition. And when 
these things were taken away they complained, as Micah did, 
"Ye have taken away my gods." But no doubt their religious 
character was improved, by removing these objects of super- 
stitious reverence. So that the church, on the whole, has 
been greatly the gainer by the innovations. Thus you see that 
the present mode of a minister's dress has been gained by a 
series of new measures. 

2. In regard to the order of public worship. 

The same difficulties have been met in effecting every 
change, because the church have felt as if God had establish- 
ed just the mode which they tvere used to. 

(1.) Psalm Boohs. Formerly it was customary to sing 
David's Psalms. By-and-by there was introduced a version 
of the Psalms in rhyme. This was very bad, to be sure. 
When ministers tried to introduce them, the churches were 
distracted, people violently opposed, and great trouble was 
created by the innovation. But the new measure triumphed. 

Afterwards another version was brought forward in a bet- 
ter style of poetry, and its introduction was opposed with 
much contention, as a new measure. And finally Watts's ver- 
sion, which is still opposed in many churches. No longer ago 
than 1828, when I was in Philadelphia, I was told that a 
minister there was preaching a course of lectures on psalmody 
to his congregation, for the purpose of bringing them to use 
a better version of psalms and hymns than the one they were 
accustomed to. And even now, in a great many congrega- 
tions, there are people who will go out of church, if a psalm 
or hymn is given out from a new book. And if Watts's 
Psalms should be adopted, they would secede and form a new 
congregation, rather than tolerate such an innovation. The 
same sort of feeling has been excited by introducing the 
" Village Hymns" in prayer meetings. In one Presbyterian 
congregation in this city, within a few years, the minister's 
wife wished to introduce the Village Hymns into the female 
prayer meetings, not daring to go any further. She thought 
she was going to succeed. But some of the careful souls 
found out that it was made in New England, and refused to 
admit it. " It is a Hopkinsian thing, I dare say." 

(2.) Lining the Hymns. Formerly, when there were but 
few books, it was the custom to line the hymns, as it was 
called. The deacon used to stand up before the pulpit, and 
read off the psalm or hymn, a line at a time, or two lines at a 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 243 

time, and then sing, and the rest would all fall in. By-and-by, 
they began to introduce books, and let every one sing from 
his book. And what an innovation ! Alas, what confusion 
and disorder it made ! How could the good people worship 
God in singing, without having the deacon to line off the 
hymn in his holy tone, for the holiness of it seemed to con- 
sist very much in the tone, which was such that you could 
hardly tell whether he was reading or singing. 

(3.) Choirs. Afterwards another innovation was carried. 
It was thought best to have a select choir of singers sit by 
themselves and sing, so as to give an opportunity to improve 
the music. But this was bitterly opposed. Oh how many con- 
gregations were torn and rent in sunder, by the desire of min- 
isters and some leading individuals to bring about an improve- 
ment in the cultivation of music, by forming choirs of singers. 
People talked about innovations and new measures, and 
thought great evils were coming to the churches, because the 
singers were seated by themselves, and cultivated music, and 
learned new tunes that the old people could not sing. It did 
not use to be so when they were young, and they would not 
tolerate such new lights and novelties in the church. 

(4.) Pitchpipes. When music was cultivated, and choirs 
seated together, then the singers wanted a pitchpipe. For- 
merly, when the lines were given out by the deacon or clerk, 
he would strike off into the tune, and the rest would follow as 
well as they could. But when the leaders of choirs begun to 
use pitchpipes for the purpose of pitching all their voices on 
precisely the same key, what vast confusion it made ! I heard 
a clergyman say that an elder in the town where he used to 
live, would get up and leave the house whenever he heard the 
chorister blow his pipe. "Away with your whistle," said he. 
"What! whistle in the house of God!" He thought it a 
profanation. 

(5.) Instrumental' Music. By and by, in some congregations, 
various instruments were introduced for the purpose of aid- 
ing the singers, and improving the music. When the bass 
viol was first introduced, it made a great commotion. People 
insisted they might just as well have a fiddle in the house of 
God. " Why, it is a fiddle, it is made just like a fiddle, only a 
little larger, and who can worship where there is a fiddle ? 
By and by you will want to dance in the meeting house." 
Who has not heard these things talked of, as matters of the 
most vital importance to the cause of religion and the purity 
of the church ? Ministers, in grave ecclesiastical assemblies, 
have spent days in discussing them. In a synod in the Pres- 



244 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

byterian church, only a few years ago, it was seriously talked 
of by some, as a matter worthy of discipline in a certain 
church, that they had an organ in the house of God. This 
within a few years. And there are many churches now who 
would not tolerate an organ. They would not be hah so much 
excited to be told that sinners are going to hell, as to be told 
-that there is going to be an organ in the meeting house. Oh, 
in how many places can you get the church to do anything 
else, easier than to come along in an easy and natural way to 
do what is needed, and wisest, and best, for promoting relig- 
ion and saving souls. They act as if they had a " Thus saith 
the Lord " for every custom and practice that has been hand- 
ed down to them, or that they have long followed themselves, 
however absurd or injurious. 

( 6. ) Extemporary Prayers. Hpw many people are there, who 
talk just as if the Prayer Book was of divine institution ! And 
I suppose multitudes believe it is. And in some parts of the 
church a man would not be allowed to pray without his book 
before him. 

(7.) Preaching without notes. A few years since, a lady in 
Philadelphia was invited to hear a certain minister preach, 
and she refused, because he did not read his sermons. She 
seemed to think it would be profane for a man to go into the 
pulpit and talk, just as if he was talking to the people about 
some interesting and important subject. As if God had 
enjoined the use of notes and written sermons. They do not 
know that notes themselves are an innovation, and a modern 
one too. They were introduced in a time of political difficul- 
ties in England. The ministers were afraid they should be 
accused of preaching something against the government, un- 
less they could show what they had preached, by having all 
written down beforehand. And with a time-serving spirit, 
they yielded to political considerations, and imposed a yoke 
of bondage upon the church. And, now in many places, they 
cannot tolerate extempore preaching. 

(8. ) Kneeling in Prayer. This has made a great disturbance 
in many parts of the country. The time has been in the Con- 
gregational churches in New England, when a man or woman 
would be ashamed to be seen kneeling at a prayer meeting, 
for fear of being taken for a Methodist. I have prayed in 
families where I was the only person that would kneel. The 
others all stood, lest they should imitate the Methodists, I 
suppose, and thus countenance innovations upon the estab- 
lished form. Others, again, talk as if there was no other pos- 
ture but kneeling, that could be acceptable in prayer. 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 245 

3. Labors of Laymen. 

(1.) Lay Prayers. Much objection was formerly made 
against allowing any man to pray or to take a part in manag- 
ing a prayer meeting, unless he was a clergyman. It used to 
be said that for a layman to pray in public, was interfering 
with the dignity of ministers, and was not to be tolerated. A 
minister in Pennsylvania told me that, a few years ago, he ap- 
pointed a prayer meeting in the church, and the elders oppos- 
ed it and turned it out of the house. They said they would 
not have such work, they had hired a minister to do the pray- 
ing, and he should do it, and they were not going to have 
common men praying. 

Ministers and many others have very extensively objected 
to a layman's praying in public, and especially in the pres- 
ence of a minister. That would let down the authority of the 
clergy, and was not to be tolerated. At a synod held in this State, 
there was a synodical prayer meeting appointed. The com- 
mittee of arrangements, as it was to be a formal thing, desig- 
nated beforehand the persons who were to take a part, and 
named two clergymen and one layman. The layman was a 
man of talents and information equal to most ministers. But 
one doctor of divinity got up and seriously objected to a lay- 
man's being asked to pray before that synod. It was not 
usual, he said ; it infringed upon the rights of the clergy, and 
he wished no innovations. What a state of things ! 

(2.) Lay exhortation. This has been made a question of 
vast importance, one which has agitated all New England, 
and many other parts of the country, whether laymen ought 
to be allowed to exhort in public meetings. Many ministers 
have labored to shut up the mouths of laymen entirely. They 
overlooked the practice of the primitive churches. So much 
opposition was made to this practice nearly a hundred years 
ago, that President Edwards actually had to take up the sub- 
ject, and write a labored defence of the rights and duties of 
laymen. But the opposition has not entirely ceased to this 
day. " What ! A man that is not a minister, to talk in pub- 
lic ! it will create confusion, it will let down the ministry ; 
what will people think of us, ministers, if we allow common 
men to do the same things that ice do ? " Astonishing ! 

But now, all these things are gone by, in most places, and 
laymen can pray and exhort without the least objection. The 
evils that were feared, from the labors of laymen, have not 
been realized, and many ministers are glad to have them ex- 
ercise their gifts in doing good. 

3. Female Prayer Meetings. Within the last few years, 



246 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS, 

female prayer meetings have been extensively opposed in this 
State. What dreadful things ! A minister, now dead, said that 
when he first attempted to establish these meetings, he had 
all the clergy around opposed to him. " Set women to pray- 
ing ? Why, the next thing, I suppose, will be to set them to 
preaching." And serious apprehensions were entertained for 
the safety of Zion, if women should be allowed to get together 
to pray. And even now, they are not tolerated in some 
churches. 

So it has been in regard to all the active movements of the 
church. Missions, Sunday Schools, and everything of the 
kind, have been opposed, and have gained their present hold 
in the church only by a succession of struggles and a series 
of innovations. A Baptist Association in Pennsylvania, some 
years since, disclaimed all fellowship with any minister that 
had been liberally educated, or that supported Missions, Bible 
Societies, Sabbath Schools, Temperance Societies, etc. All 
these were denounced as New Measures, not found in the 
Bible, and that would necessarily lead to distraction and con- 
fusion in the churches. The same thing has been done by 
some among the German churches. And in many Presbyter- 
ian churches, there are found those who will take the same 
ground, and denounce all these things, with the exception, 
perhaps, of an educated ministry, as innovations, new meas- 
ures, new lights, going in their own strength, and the like, and 
as calculated to do great evil. 

5. I will mention severed men who have in Divine providence 
been set forward as prominent in introducing these innova- 
tions. 

(1.) The apostles were great innovators, as you all know. 
After the resurrection, and after the Holy Spirit was poured 
out upon them, they set out to remodel the church. They 
broke down the Jewish system of measures and rooted it out, 
so as to leave scarcely a vestige. 

(2.) Luther and the Bef owners. You all know what difficul- 
ties they had to contend with, and the reason was, that they 
were trying to introduce new measures — new modes of per- 
forming the public duties of religion, and new expedients to 
bring the Gospel with power to the hearts of men. All the 
strange and ridiculous things of the Koman Catholics were 
held to in the church with pertinacious obstinacy, as if they 
were of Divine authority. And such an excitement was raised 
by the attempt to change them, as well nigh involved all Eu- 
rope in blood. 

(3.) Wesley and his coadjido?*s. Wesley did not at first tear 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 247 

oflf from the Established Church in England, but formed little 
classes everywhere, thai grew into a church within a church. 
He remained in the Episcopal church, but he introduced so 
much of new measures, as to fill all England with excitement 
and uproar and opposition, and he was everywhere denounced 
as an innovator and a stirrer up of sedition, and a teacher of 
new things which it was not lawful to receive. 

Whitefield was a man of the same school, and like Wesley 
was an innovator. I believe he and several individuals of his 
associates were expelled from college for getting up such a new 
measure, as a social prayer meeting. They would pray to- 
gether and expound the Scriptures, and this was such a dar- 
ing novelty that it could not be borne. When Whitefield came 
to this country, what an astonishing opposition was raised ! 
Often he well nigh lost his life, and barely escaped by the skin* 
of his teeth. Now everybody looks upon him as the glory of 
the age in which he lived. And many of our own denomina- 
tion have so far divested themselves of prejudice as to think 
Wesley not only a good but a wise and pre-eminently useful 
man. Then almost the entire church viewed him with ani- 
mosity, fearing that the innovations he introduced would 
destroy the church. 

(4.) President Edwards, This great man was famous in 
his day for new measures. Among other innovations, he 
refused to baptize the children of impenitent parents. The 
practice of baptizing the children of the ungodly had been 
introduced in the New England churches in the preceding 
century, and had become nearly universal. President Ed- 
wards saw that the practice was wrong, and he refused to do 
it, and the refusal shook all the churches of New England. 
A hundred ministers joined and determined to put him 
down. He wrote a book on the subject, and defeated 
them all. It produced one of the greatest excitements there 
ever was in New England. Nothing, unless it was the Revo- 
lutionary War, ever produced an equal excitement. 

The General Association of Connecticut refused to counte- 
nance Whitefield, he was such an innovator. " Why, he will 
preach out of doors, and anywhere !" Awful ! What a terri- 
ble thing, that a man should preach in the fields or in the 
streets. Cast him out 

All these were devoted men, seeking out ways to do good and 
save souls. And precisely the same kind of opposition was ex- 
perienced by all the ecclesiastical bodies, obstructing their path 
and trying to destroy their character and influence. A book, now 
extant, was written in President Edwards' time, by a doctor of 



248 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

divinity, and signed by a multitude of ministers, against 
Whitefieid and Edwards, their associates and their measures, 
A letter was published in this city by a minister against 
Whitefieid, which brought up the same objections against 
innovations that we hear now. In the time of the late oppo- 
sition to revivals in the State of New York, a copy of this 
letter was taken to the editor of a religious periodical with a 
request that he would publish it. He refused, and gave for a 
reason, that if published, many would apply it to the contro- 
versy that is going on now. I mention it merely to show 
how identical is the opposition that is raised in different 
ages against all new measures designed to advance the cause 
of religion. 

6. In the present generation, many things have been in- 
troduced which have proved useful, but have been opposed 
on the ground that they were innovations. And as many are 
still unsettled in regard to them, I have thought it best to 
make some remarks concerning them. There are three 
things in particular which have chiefly attracted remark, and 
therefore I shall speak of them. They are Anxious Meetings, 
Protracted Meetings, and the Anxious Seat. These are all op- 
posed, and are called new measures. 

(1.) Anxious Meetings. The first that I ever heard of under 
that name, was in New England, where they were appointed 
for the purpose of holding personal conversation with anxious 
sinners, and to adapt instruction to the cases of individuals, 
so as to lead them immediately to Christ. The design of 
them is evidently philosophical, but they have been opposed 
because they were new. There are two modes of conducting 
an anxious meeting, either of which may effect the object of 
them, 

(a. ) By spending a few moments in personal conversation and 
learning the state of mind of each individual, and then in an 
address to the whole, take up all their errors and remove 
their difficulties together. 

(b.) By going round to each, and taking up each individual 
case, and going over the whole ground with each one sep- 
arately, and getting them to promise to give up their hearts to 
God. Either way they are important, and have been found 
most successful in practice. But multitudes have objected 
to them because they were new. 

(2.) Protracted Meetings. These are not new, but have al- 
ways been practised, in some form or other, ever since there 
was a church on earth. The Jewish festivals were nothing 
else but protracted meetings. In regard to the manner, they 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 249 

were conducted differently from what they are now. But the 
design was the same, to devote a series of days to religious 
services, in order to make a more powerful impression of di- 
vine things upon the minds of the people. All denominations 
of Christians, when religion prospers among them, hold pro- 
tracted meetings. In Scotland they used to begin on Thurs- 
day at all their communion seasons, and continue until after 
the Sabbath. The Episcopalians, Baptists, and Methodists 
all hold protracted meetings. Yet now in our day they have 
been opposed, particularly among Presbyterians, and called 
new measures, and regarded as fraught with all manner of 
evil, notwithstanding they have been so manifestly and so ex- 
tensively blessed. I will suggest a few things that ought to 
be considered in regard to them. 

(a.) In appointing them, regard should be had to the cir- 
cumstances of the people ; whether the church are able to give 
their attention and devote their time to carry on the meeting. 
In some instances this rule has been neglected. Some have 
thought it right to break in upon the necessary business of 
the community. In the country, they would appoint the 
meeting in harvest time, and in the city in the height of the 
business season, when all the men were necessarily occupied 
and pressed with their temporal labors. In defence of this 
course it is said that our business should always be made to 
yield to God's business ? that eternal things are of so much 
more importance than temporal things, that worldly business 
of any land, and at any time, should be made to yield and give 
place to a protracted meeting. But the worldly business in 
which we are engaged is not our business. It is as much 
God's business, and as much our duty, as our prayers and 
protracted meetings are. If we do not consider our business 
in this light, we have not yet taken the first lesson in re- 
ligion ; we have not learned to do all things to the glory of 
God. With this view of the subject, separating our business 
from religion, we are living six days for ourselves, and the 
seventh for God. Real duties ^ever interfere with each 
other. Week days have their appropriate duties, and the 
Sabbath Us appropriate duties, and we are to be equally 
pious on every day in the week, and in the performance 
of the duties of every day. We are to plough, and sow, -and 
sell our goods, and attend to our various callings, with the 
same singleness of view to the glory of God, that we go to 
church on the Sabbath, and pray in our families, and read 
our Bibles. This is a first principle in religion. He that 
does not know and act on this principle has not learned the 
11* 



250 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

A B C of piety as yet. Now there are particular seasons of 
the year in which God in his providence calls upon men to 
attend to business, because worldly business at the time is 
particularly urgent, and must be done at that season, if done 
at all ; seed time and harvest for the farmer, and the busi- 
ness seasons for the merchant. And we have no right to 
say, in those particular seasons, that we will quit our business 
and have a protracted meeting. The fact is, the business is 
not ours. And unless God, by some special indication of his 
providence, shows it to be his pleasure that we should turn 
aside and have a protracted meeting at such times, I look upon 
it as tempting God to appoint them. It is saying, " O God, 
this worldly business is our business, and we are willing to lay 
it aside for thy business." Unless God has indicated it to be 
his pleasure to pour out his Spirit, and revive his work at 
such a season, and has thus called upon his people to quit, for 
the time being, their ordinary employments, and attend espe- 
cially to a protracted meeting, it appears to me that God 
might say to us in such circumstances, " Who hath required 
this of your hand ?" 

God has a right to dispose of our time as he pleases, to re- 
quire us to give up any portion of our time, or all our time, 
to duties of instruction and devotion. And when circum- 
stances plainly call for it, it is our duty to lay aside every 
other business, and make direct and continuous efforts for 
the salvation of souls. If we transact our business upon 
right principles, and from right motives, and wholly for the 
glory of God, we shall never object to go aside to attend a 
protracted meeting whenever there appears to be a call for it 
in the providence of God. A man who considers himself a 
steward or a clerk, does not consider it a hardship to rest 
from his labors on the Sabbath, but a privilege. The selfish 
oioner may feel unwilhng to suspend his business on the 
Sabbath. But the clerk, who transacts business not for him- 
self but for his employer, considers it a privilege to rest upon 
the Sabbath. So we, if wet do our business for God, shall not 
think it hard if he makes it our duty to suspend our worldly 
business and attend a protracted meeting. We should rather 
consider it in the light of a holiday. Whenever, therefore, 
you'hear a man pleading that he cannot leave his business to 
attend a protracted meeting — that it is his duty to attend to 
business, there is reason to fear that he considers the business 
as his own, and the meeting as God's business. If he felt 
that the business of the store or farm was as much God's 
business as attending a protracted meeting, he would doubt- 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 251 

less be very willing to rest from his worldly toils, and go up 
to the house of God and be refreshed whenever there was an 
indication, on the part of God, that the community was called 
to that work. It is highly worthy of remark, that the Jew- 
ish festivals were appointed at those seasons of the year 
when there was the least pressure of indispensable worldly 
business. 

In some instances, such meetings have been appointed in 
the very pressure of the business seasons, and have been fol- 
lowed with no good results, evidently for the want of atten- 
tion to the rule here laid down. In other cases, meetings 
have been appointed in seasons when there was a great 
pressure of worldly business, and have been signally blessed. 
But in those cases the blessing followed because the meet- 
ing was appointed in obedience to the indications of the will 
of God, by those who had spiritual discernment, and under- 
stood the signs of the times. And in many cases, doubt- 
less, individuals have attended who really supposed them- 
selves to be giving up their own business, to attend to God's 
business, and in such cases they made what they supposed 
to be a real sacrifice, and God in mercy granted them the 
blessing. 

(b.) Ordinarily, a protracted meeting should be conducted 
through, and the labor chiefly performed by, the same minister, 
if possible. Sometimes protracted meetings have been held 
and dependence placed on ministers coming in from day to 
day. And they would have no blessing. And the reason 
was obvious. They did not come in a state of mind to enter 
into the work, and they did not know the state of people's 
minds, so as to know what to preach. Suppose a person who 
was sick should call in a different physician every day. He 
would not know what the symptoms had been, nor what 
was the course of the disease or of the treatment, nor what 
remedies had been tried, nor what the patient could bear. 
Why, he would certainly kill the patient. Just so in a pro- 
tracted meeting, carried on by a succession of ministers. 
None of them get into the spirit of it, and generally they do 
more hurt than good. 

A protracted meeting should not, ordinarily, be appointed, 
unless they can secure the right kind of help, and get a min- 
ister or two who will agree to stay on the ground till the 
meeting is done. Then they will probably secure a rich 
blessing*. 

(c.) There should not be so many public meetings as to in- 
terfere with the duties of the closet and of the family. Other- 



252 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

wise Christians will lose their spirituality and let go their hold 
of God, and the meeting will run down. 

(d.) Families should not put themselves out so much in 
entertaining strangers as to neglect prayer and other duties. It 
is often the case that when a protracted meeting is held, some 
of the principal families in the church, I mean those who are 
principally relied on to sustain the meetings, do not get into 
the work at all. And the reason is, that they are encumbered 
with much serving. They often take needless trouble to pro- 
vide for guests who come from a distance to the meeting, and 
lay themselves out very foolishly to make an entertainment, 
not only comfortable but sumptuous. It should always be 
understood that it is the duty of families to have as little 
working and parade as possible, and to get along with their 
hospitality in the easiest way, so that they may all have time 
to pray, and go to the meeting, and to attend to the things 
of the kingdom. 

(e.) By all means guard against unnecessarily keeping late 
hours. If people keep late hours, night after night, they will 
inevitably wear out the body, and their health will fail, and 
there will be a reaction. They sometimes allow themselves 
to get so excited as to lose their sleep, and become irregular 
in their meals, till they break down, and a reaction must 
come. Unless there is the greatest pains taken to keep regu- 
lar, the excitement will get so great that nature will give way, 
and they run down, and the work stops. 

(/.) All sectarianism should be carefully avoided. If a 
sectarian spirit breaks out, either in the preaching, or pray- 
ing, or conversation, it will counteract all the good of the 
meeting. 

(g.) Be watchful against placing dependence on a protracted 
meeting, as if that of itself would produce a revival. This is 
a point of great danger, and has always been so. This is 
the great reason why the church in successive generations 
has always had to give up her measures — because Christians 
had come to rely on them for success. So it has been in some 
places, in regard to Protracted Meetings. They have been so 
blessed that in some places the petfple have thought that if 
they should only have a protracted meeting, they would have 
a blessing, and sinners would be converted of course. And 
so they have appointed their meeting, without any prepar- 
ation in the church, and just sent abroad for some minister 
of note, and set him to preaching, as if that would convert 
sinners. It is obvious that the blessing would be withheld 
from a meeting got up in this way. 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 253 

(h.) Avoid adopting the idea that a revival cannot be en- 
joyed without a Protracted Meeting. Some churches have got 
into a morbid state of feeling on this subject. Their zeal 
has become all spasmodic and feverish, so that they never 
think of doing anything to promote a revival, only in that 
way. YvHien a protracted meeting is held, they will seem to 
be wonderfully zealous, and then sink down to a torpid state 
till another protracted meeting produces another spasm. And 
now multitudes in the church think it is necessary to give up 
protracted meetings because they are abused in this way. 
This ought to be guarded against, in every church, so that 
they may not be driven to give them up, and lose all the bene- 
fits that protracted meetings are calculated to produce. 



(3.) The Anxious Seed. 

By this I mean the appointment of some particular seat in 
the place of meeting, where the anxious may come and be 
addressed particularly, and be made subjects of prayer, and 
sometimes be conversed with individually. Of late this 
measure has met with more opposition than any of the 
others. What is the great objection ? I cannot see it. The 
design of the anxious seat is undoubtedly philosophical, and 
according to the laws of mind. It has two bearings : 

1. When a person is seriously troubled in mind, every- 
body knows that there is a powerful tendency to conceal 
it When a person is borne down with a sense of his 
condition, if you can get him willing to have it known, if 
you can get him to break away from the chains of pride, 
you have gained an important point towards his conver- 
sion. This is agreeable to the philosophy of the human 
mind. And how many thousands are there who will bless 
God to eternity, that when pressed by the truth they were 
ever brought to take this step, by which they threw off the 
idea that it was a dreadful thing to have anybody know that 
they were serious about their souls. 

2. Another bearing of the anxious seat is to detect decep- 
tion and delusion, and thus prevent false hopes. It has been 
opposed on the ground, that it was calculated to create delu- 
sion and false hopes. But this objection is unreasonable. 
The truth is the other way. Suppose I were preaching on 
the subject of Temperance, and that I should first show the 
evils of intemperance, and bring. up the drunkard and his 
family, and show the various evils produced, till every heart 



254 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

is beating with emotion. Then I portray the great danger 
of moderate drinking, and show how it leads to intoxication 
and ruin, and that there is no safety but in TOTAL ABSTI- 
NENCE, till a hundred hearts are ready to say, "I will 
nevef drink another drop of ardent spirit in the world ; if I 
do, I shall expect to find a drunkard's grave." Now, I stop 
short, and ]et the pledge be circulated, and everyone that is 
fully resolved is ready to sign it. But how many will begin 
to draw back and hesitate, when you begin to call on them to 
sign a pledge of total abstinence. One says to himself, 
" Shall I sign it or not ? I thought my mind was made up, 
but this signing a pledge never to drink again, I do not know 
about that." Thus you see that when a person is called upon 
to give a pledge, if he is found not to be decided, he makes it 
manifest that he was not sincere. That is, he never came to 
that resolution on the subject, which could be relied on to 
control his future life. Just so with the awakened sinner. 
Preach to him, and at the moment he thinks he is willing to 
do anything ; he thinks he is determined to serve the Lord ; 
but bring him to the test, call on him to do one thing, to take 
one step that shall identify him with the people of God, or 
cross his pride — his pride comes up, and he refuses ; his delu- 
sion is brought out, and he finds himself a lost sinner still ; 
whereas, if you had not done it, he might have gone away 
flattering himself that he was a Christian. If you say to 
him, " There is the anxious seat, come out and avow your 
determination to be on the Lord's side," and if he is not 
willing to do so small a thing as that, then he is not willing 
to do anything, and there he is, brought out before his own 
conscience. It uncovers the delusion of the human heart, 
and prevents a great many spurious conversions, by showing 
those who might otherwise imagine themselves willing to do 
anything for Christ, that in fact they are willing to do 
nothing. 

The church has always felt it necessary to have something 
of the kind to answer this very purpose. In the days of the 
apostles baptism answered this purpose. The Gospel was 
preached to the people, and then all those who were willing to 
be on the side of Christ were called on to be baptized. It 
held the precise place that the anxious seat does now, as a 
public manifestation of their determination to be Christians. 
And in modern times, those who have been violently opposed 
to the anxious seat have been obliged to adopt some substi- 
tute, or they could not get along in promoting a revival. Some 
have adopted the expedient of inviting the people who were 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 255 

anxious for their souls to stay for conversation after the rest 
of the congregation had retired. But what is the differ- 
ence? This is as much setting up a test as the other. 
Others, who would be much ashamed to employ the anxious 
seat, have asked those who have any feeling on the subject to 
sit still in then- seats when the rest retire. Others have called 
the anxious to retire into the lecture room. The object of 
all these is the same, and the principle is the same, to bring 
people out from the refuge of false shame. One man I heard 
of who was very far gone in his opposition to new measures, 
In one of his meetings he requested all those who were willing 
to submit to God, or desired to be made subjects of prayer, 
to signify it by leaning forward and putting their heads down 
upon the pew before them. Who does not see that this was 
a mere evasion of the anxious seat, and that it was designed 
to answer the purpose in its place, and he adopted this be- 
cause he felt that something of the kind was important ? 

Now what objection is there against taking a particular 
seat, or rising up, or going into the lecture-room ? They all 
mean the same thing, when properly conducted. And they 
are not novelties in principle at all. The thing has always 
been done in substance. In Joshua's day, he called on the 
people to decide what they would do, and they spoke right 
out in the meeting, " We will serve the Lord ; the Lord our 
God will we serve, and his voice will we obey." 

REMARKS. 

1. If we examine the history of the church we shall find 
that there never has been an extensive reformation, except 
by new measures. Whenever the churches get settled down 
into a form of doing things, they soon get to rely upon the 
outward doing of it, and so retain the form of religion while 
they lose the substance. And then it has always been found 
impossible to arouse the:n so as to bring about a reformation 
of the evils, and produce a revival of religion, by simply pur- 
suing that established form. Perhaps it is not too much to 
say, that it is impossible for God himself to bring about re- 
formations but by new measures. At least, it is a fact that 
God has always chosen this way, as the wisest and best that 
he could devise or adopt. And although it has always been 
the case, that the very measures which God has chosen to 
employ, and which he has blessed in reviving his work, have 
been opposed as new measures, and have been denounced, 
yet he has continued to act upon the same principle. When 



256 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

lie has found that a certain mode has lost its influence by 
having become a form, he brings up some new measure, 
which will BREAK IN upon their lazy habits, and WAKE 
UP a slumbering church. And great good has resulted. 

2. The same distinctions, in substance, that now exist, 
have always existed, in all seasons of reformation # and re- 
vival of religion. There have always been those who par- 
ticularly adhered to their forms and notions, and precise 
way of doing things, as if they had a "Thus saith the 
Lord" for every one of them. They have called those that 
differed from them, who were trying to roll the ark of sal- 
vation forward, Methodists, New Lights, Radicals, New 
School, New Divinity, and various other opprobrious names. 
And the declensions that have followed have been uni- 
formly owing to two causes, which should by no means be 
overlooked by the church. 

(1.) The Old School, or Old Measure party, have perse- 
vered in their opposition, and eagerly seized hold of any real 
or apparent indiscretion in the friends of the work. 

In such cases, the churches have gradually lost their confi- 
dence in the opposition to new measures, and the cry of 
"New Divinity," and "Innovation" has ceased to alarm 
them. They see that the blessing of God is with those that 
are thus accused of new measures and innovation, and the 
continued opposition of the Old School, together with the 
continued success of the New School, have destroyed their 
confidence in the opposition, and they get tired of hearing 
the incessant cry of " New Lights," and " New Divinity," and 
"New Measures." Thus the scale has turned, and the 
churches have pronounced a verdict in favor of the New 
School, and of condemnation against the Old School. 

(2.) But now, mark me : right here in this state of things, 
the devil has, again and again, taken the advantage, and in- 
dividuals have risen up, and being sustained by the confi- 
dence of the churches in the New Measure party, and finding- 
them sick of opposition, and ready to do anything that would 
promote the interests of Christ's kingdom, they have driven 
headlong themselves, and in some instances have carried the 
churches into the very vortex of those difficulties which have 
been predicted by their opposers. Thus, when the battle 
had been fought, and the victory gained, the rash zeal of some 
well-meaning but headlong individuals, has brought about a 
reaction that has spread a pall over the churches for years. 
This was the case, as is well known, in the days of President 
Edwards. Here is a rock, upon which a light-house is now 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 257 

built, and upon which if the church now run aground, 
both parties are entirely without excuse. It is now well 
known, or ought to be known, that the declension which fol- 
lowed the revivals in those days, together with the declen- 
sions which have repeatedly occurred, were owing to the 
combined influence of the continued and pertinacious oppo- 
sition of the Old School, and the ultimate bad spirit and 
recklessness of some individuals of the New School. 

And here the note of alarm should be distinctly sounded 
to both parties, lest the devil should prevail against us, at 
the very point, and under the very circumstances, where he 
has so often prevailed. Shall the church never learn wis- 
dom from experience ? How often, oh, how often must these 
scenes be acted over before the millennium shall come ! When 
will it once be, that the church may be revived, and religion 
prevail, without exciting such opposition in tlie church, as 
eventually to bring about a reaction. 

3. The present cry against new measures is highly ridicu- 
lous, when we consider the quarter from which it comes, and 
all the circumstances in the case. It is truly astonishing that 
grave ministers should really feel alarmed at the new meas- 
ures of the present day, as if new measures were something 
new under the sun, and as if the present form and manner 
of doing things had descended from the apostles, and were 
established by a " Thus saith the Lord :" when the truth is, 
that every step of the church's advance from the gross dark- 
ness of Popery, has been through the introduction of one 
new measure after another. We now look with astonish- 
ment, and are inclined to look almost with contempt, upon 
the cry of " Innovation," that has preceded our day ; and as 
we review the fears that multitudes in the church have enter- 
tained in by-gone days with respect to innovation, we find it 
difficult to account for what appear to us the groundless and 
absurd, at least, if not ridiculous objections and difficulties 
which they made. But, my hearers, is it not wonderful, that 
at this late day, after the church has had so much experience 
in these matters, that grave and pious men should seriously 
feel alarmed at the introduction of the simple, the philoso- 
phical, and greatly prospered measures of the last ten years ? 
As if new measures were something not to be tolerated, of 
highly disastrous tendency, and that should wake the notes 
and echoes of alarm in every nook and corner of the church. 

4. We see why it is that those who have been making the 
ado about new measures have not been successful in promoting 
revivals. 



258 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

They have been taken up with the evils, real or imaginary, 
which have attended this great and blessed work of God. 
That there have been evils, no one will pretend to deny. But 
I do believe, that no revival ever existed since the world be- 
gan, of so great power and extent as the one that has pre- 
vailed for the last ten years, which has not been attended 
with as great or greater evils. Still a large portion of the 
church have been frightening themselves and others, by giv- 
ing constant attention to the evils of revivals. One of the 
professors in a Presbyterian Theological Seminary, felt it his 
duty to write a series of letters to Presbyterians, which were 
extensively circulated, the object of which seemed to be to 
sound the note of alarm throughout all the borders of the 
church, in regard to the evils attending revivals. While men 
are taken up with the evils instead of the excellencies of a 
blessed work of God, how can it be expected that they will 
be useful in promoting it ? I would say all this in great 
kindness, but still it is a point upon which I must not be 
silent. 

5. Without new measures it is impossible that the church 
should succeed in gaining the attention of the world to re- 
ligion. There are so many exciting subjects constantly 
brought before the public mind, such a running to and 
fro, so many that cry " Lo here," and " Lo there," that the 
church cannot maintain her ground, cannot command atten- 
tion, without very exciting preaching, and sufficient novelty 
in measures, to get the public ear. The measures of politi- 
cians, of infidels and heretics, the scrambling after wealth, 
the increase of luxury, and the ten thousand exciting and 
counteracting influences that bear upon the church and upon 
the world, will gain their attention and turn all men away 
from the sanctuary and from the altars of the Lord, unless 
we increase in wisdom and piety, and wisely adopt such new 
measures as are calculated to get the attention of men to the 
Gospel of Christ. I have already said, in the course of these 
lectures, thai novelties should be introduced no faster than 
they are really called for. They should be introduced with 
the greatest wisdom, and caution, and prayerfulness, and in 
a manner calculated to excite as little opposition as possible. 
But new measures we must have. And may God prevent the 
church from settling down in any set of forms, and getting 
the present or any other edition of her measures stereotyped. 

6. It is evident that we must have more exciting preach- 
ing, to meet the character and wants of the age. Ministers 
are generally beginning to find this out. And some of them 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 259 

complain of it, and suppose it to be owing to new measures, 
as they call them. They say that such ministers as our 
fathers would have been glad to hear, now cannot be heard, 
cannot get a settlement, nor collect an audience. And they 
think that new measures have perverted the taste of the 
people. But this is not the difficulty. The character of the 
age is changed, and these men have not conformed to it, but 
retain the same stiff, dry, prosing style of preaching that 
answered half a century ago. 

Look at the Methodists. Many of their ministers are 
unlearned, in the common sense of the term, many of them 
taken right from the shop or the farm, and yet they have 
gathered congregations, and pushed their way, and won souls 
everywhere. Wherever the Methodists have gone, their plain, 
pointed and simple, but warm and animated mode of preach- 
ing has always gathered congregations. Few Presbyterian 
ministers have gathered so large assemblies, or won so many 
souls. Now are we to be told that we must pursue the same 
old, formal mode of doing things, amidst all these changes ? 
As well might the North River be rolled back, as the world 
converted under such preaching. Those who adopt a dif- 
ferent style of preaching, as the Methodists have done, will 
run away from us. The world will escape from under the 
influence of this old fashioned or rather new fashioned minis- 
try. It is impossible that the public mind should be held 
by such preaching. We must have exciting, powerful preach- 
ing, or the devil will have the people, except what the Meth- 
odists can save. It is impossible that our ministers should 
continue to do good, unless we have innovations in regard 
to the style of preaching. Many ministers are finding it 
out already, that a Methodist preacher, without the advant- 
ages of a liberal education, will draw a congregation around 
him which a Presbyterian minister, with perhaps ten times 
as much learning, cannot equal, because he has not the 
earnest manner of the other, and does not pour out fire upon 
his hearers when he preaches. 

7. We see the importance of having young ministers obtain 
right views of revivals. In a multitude of cases, I have seen 
that great pains are taken to frighten our young men, who are 
preparing for the ministry, about the evils of revivals, new 
measures, and the like. Young men in some theological 
seminaries are taught to look upon new measures as if they 
were the very inventions of the devil. How can such men 
have revivals. So when they come out, they look about, and 
watch, and start, as if the devil was there. Some young men 



260 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

in Princeton, a few years ago, came out with an essay upon 
the "evils of revivals." I should like to know, now, how 
many of those young men have enjoyed revivals among their 
people, since they have been in the ministry ; and if any 
have, I should like to know whether they have not repented 
of that piece about the evils of revivals. 

If I had a voice so loud as to be heard at Princeton, I 
would speak to those young men on this subject. It is high 
time to talk plainly on this point. The church is groaning in 
all her borders for the want of suitable ministers. Good 
men are laboring and are willing to labor night and day to 
assist in educating young men for the ministry, to promote 
revivals of religion ; and when they come out of the semi- 
nary, some of them are as shy of all the measures that God 
blesses as they are of popery itself. 

Shall it be so always ? Must we educate young men for the 
ministry, and have them come out frightened to death about 
new measures, as if there had never been any such thing as 
new measures. They ought to know that new measures are 
no new thing in the church. Let them GO ALONG, and 
keep at work themselves, and not be frightened about new 
measures. I have been pained to see that some men, in giv- 
ing accounts of revivals, have evidently felt themselves 
obliged to be particular in detailing the measures used, to 
avoid the inference that new measures were introduced ; evi- 
dently feeling that even the church would undervalue the re- 
vival unless it appeared to have been promoted without new 
measures. Besides, this caution in detailing the measures to 
demonstrate that there was nothing new, looks like admitting 
that new measures are wrong because they are new, and that 
a revival is more valuable because it was not promoted by 
new measures. In this way, I apprehend that much evil has 
been done, already, and if the practice, is to continue, it must 
come to this, that a revival must be judged of, by the fact 
that it occurred in connection with new or old measures. I 
never will countenance such a spirit, nor condescend to guard 
an account of a revival against the imputation of new or old 
measures. I believe new measures are right, that is, that it 
is no objection to a measure that it is new or old. 

Let a minister enter fully into his work, and pour out his 
heart to God for a blessing, and' whenever he sees the want 
of any measure to bring the truth more powerfully before 
the minds of the people, let him adopt it and not be afraid, 
and God will not withhold his blessing. If ministers will 
not go forward, and will not preach the Gospel with power 



MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 261 

and earnestness, and will not turn out of their tracks to do 
anything new for the purpose of saying souls, they will grieve 
the Holy Spirit away, and God will visit them with his curse, 
and raise up other ministers to do his work in the world. 

8. It is the right and duty of ministers to adopt new measures 
for promoting revivals. In some places the church have op- 
posed their minister when he has attempted to employ those 
measures which God has blessed for a revival, and have gone 
so far as to give up their prayer meetings, and give up labor- 
ing to save souls, and stand aloof froni everything, because 
their minister has adopted what they call new measures. No 
matter how reasonable the measures are in themselves, nor 
how seasonable, nor how much God may bless them. It is 
enough that they are called new measures, and they will not 
have anything to do with new measures, nor tolerate them 
among the people. And thus they fall out by the way, and 
grieve away the Spirit of God, and put a stop to the revival, 
when the world around them is going to hell. 

Finally. — This zealous adherence to particular forms and 
modes of doing things, which has led the church to resist in- 
novations in measures, savors strongly of fanaticism. And what 
is not a little singular, is that fanatics of this stamp are al- 
ways the first to cry out " fanaticism," "What is that but 
fanaticism in the Eoman Catholic Church, that causes them 
to adhere with such pertinacity to their particular modes, and 
forms, and ceremonies, and fooleries? They act as if all 
these things were established by divine authority ; as if there 
were a " Thus saith the Lord" for every one of them. Now 
we justly style this a spirit of fanaticism, and esteem it worthy 
of rebuke. But it is just as absolutely fanatical, for the Pres- 
byterian Church, or any other church, to be sticklish for her 
particular forms, and to act as if they were established by di- 
vine authority. The fact is, that God has established, in no 
church, any particular form, or manner of worship, for pro- 
moting the interests of religion. The Scriptures are entirely 
silent on these subjects, under the Gospel dispensation, and 
the church is left to exercise her own discretion in relation to 
all such matters. And I hope it will not be thought unkind, 
when I say again, that to me it appears, that the unkind, 
angry zeal for a certain mode and maimer of doing things, 
and the overbearing, exterminating cry against new measures, 

SAVORS STRONGLY OF FANATICISM. 

^ The only thing insisted upon under the Gospel dispensa- 
tion, in regard to measures, is that there should be decency 
and order. " Let all things be done decently and in order." 



262 MEASURES TO PROMOTE REVIVALS. 

We are required to guard against all confusion and disorder- 
ly conduct. But what is decency and order ? Will it be pre- 
tended that an anxious meeting, or a protracted meeting, or 
an anxious seat, is inconsistent with decency and order ? I 
should most sincerely deprecate, and most firmly resist what- 
ever was indecent and disorderly in the worship of God's 
house. But I do not suppose that by " order" we are to un- 
derstand any particular set mode, in which any church may 
have been accustomed to perform their service. 



LECTUEE XV. 

HTNDEKANCES TO EEVTVALS. 

Text.— I am doine: a great work, so that I cannot come down. Why should the 
work cease, whilst I leave it, and come down to you.— Nehemiah vi. 3. 

This servant of God had come down from Babylon to re- 
build the temple and re-establish the worship of God at 
Jerusalem, the city of his fathers' sepulchres. "When it was 
discovered by Sanballat and certain individuals, his allies, 
who had long enjoyed the desolations of Zion, that now the 
temple, and the holy city were about to be rebuilt, they raised 
a great opposition. Sanballat and the other leaders tried in 
several ways to divert Nehemiah and his friends, and prevent 
them from going forward in their work ; at one time they 
threatened them, and then complained that they were going 
to rebel against the king. Again, they insisted that their de- 
sign was not pious but political, to which Nehemiah replied 
by a simple and prompt denial, " There are no such things 
done as thou sayest, but thou feignest them out of thine own 
heart." Finally, Sanballat sent a message to Nehemiah, re- 
questing him to meet in the plain of Ono, to discuss the 
whole matter amicably and have the difficulty adjusted, but 
designed to do him mischief. They had found that they 
could not frighten Nehemiah, and now they wanted to come 
round him by artifice and fraud, and draw him off from the 
vigorous prosecution of his work. But he replied, "I am 
doing a great work, so that I cannot come down : why should 
the work cease, whilst I come down to you ?" 

It has always been the case, whenever any of the servants 
of God do anything in his cause, and there appears to be a 
2^rohability that that they will succeed, that Satan by his 
agents regularly attempts to divert their minds and nullify 
their labors. So it has been during the last ten years, in 
which there have been such remarkable revivals through the 
length and breadth of the land. These revivals have been 
very great and powerful, and extensive. It has been esti- 
mated that not less than two hundred thousand persons have 
been converted to God in that time. 

And the devil has been busy in his devices to divert and 

(263) 



264 HINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

distract the people of God, and turn off their energies from 
pushing forward the great work of salvation. In remarking 
on the subject, I propose to show, 

I. That a Eevival of Eeligion is a great work. 

II. To mention several things which may put a stop to it. 

III. Endeavor to show what must be done for the continu- 
ance of this great revival. 

I. I am to show that a Eevival of Beligion is a great work. 
It is a great work, because in it are great interests involved. 

In a Eevival of Eeligion are involved both the glory of God, 
so far as it respects the government of this world, and the sal- 
vation of men. Two things that are of infinite importance are 
involved in it. The greatness of a work is to be estimated by 
the greatness of the consequences depending on it. And this 
is the measure of its importance. 

II. I am to mention several things which may put a stop to 
a revival. 

Some have talked very foolishly on this subject, as if 
nothing could injure a genuine revival. They say, "If your 
revival is a work of God, it cannot be stopped ; can any 
created being stop God?" Now I ask if this is common 
sense ? Formerly, it used to be the established belief that a 
revival could not be stopped, because it was the work of God. 
And so they supposed it would go on, whatever might be 
done to hinder it, in the church or out of it. Bat the farmer 
might just as well reason so, and think he could go and cut 
down his wheat and not hurt the crop, because it is God that 
makes grain grow. A revival is the work of God, and so is a 
crop of wheat ; and God is as much dependent on the use of 
means in one case as the other. And therefore a revival is as 
liable to be injured as a w T heat-field. 

1. A revival will stop whenever the church believe it is going 
to cease. The church are the instruments with which God 
carries on this work, and they are to work in it voluntarily 
and with their hearts. Nothing is more fatal to a revival 
than for its friends to predict that it is going to stop. No 
matter what the enemies of the work may say about it, pre- 
dicting that it will all run out and come to nothing, and the 
like. They cannot stop it in this way ; but the friends must 
labor and pray in faith to carry it on. It is a contradiction to 
say they are laboring and praying in faith to carry on the 
work, and yet believe that it is going to stop. If they lose 
their faith, it will stop, of course. "Whenever the friends of 
revivals begin to prophesy that the revival is going to stop, 
they should be instantly rebuked, in the name of the Lord. 



HINDER AXCES TO REVIVALS. 265 

If the idea once begins to prevail, and if you cannot counter- 
act it and root it out, the revival will infallibly cease ; for it is 
indispensable to the work, that Christians should labor and 
pray in faith to promote it, and it is a contradiction to say 
that they can labor in faith for its continuance, while they be- 
lieve that it is about to cease. 

2. A revival will cease when Christians consent that it should 
cease. Sometimes Christians see that the revival is in danger 
of ceasing, and that if something effectual is not done, it will 
come to a stand. If this fact distresses them, and drives 
them to prayer, and to fresh efforts, the work will not cease. 
When Christians love the work of God and the salvation of 
souls so well that they are distressed at the mere apprehen- 
sion of a decline, it will drive them to an agony of prayer and 
effort. If it does not drive them to agony and effort to pre- 
vent its ceasing ; if they see the danger, and do not try to 
avert it, or to renew the work, they consent that it should 
stop. There are at this time many people, all over the coun- 
try, who see revivals declining, and that they are in great 
danger of ceasing altogether, and yet they manifest but little 
distress, and seem to care but; little about it. Y/hole churches 
see their condition, and see what is coming unless there can 
be a waking up, and yet they are at ease, and do not groan 
and agonize in prayer, that God would revive his work. Some 
are even predicting that there is now going to be a great re- 
action, and a great dearth come over the church, as there 
did after Whitefield's and Edwards' day. And yet they are 
not startled at their own forebodings ; they are cool about 
it, and turn directly off to other things. THEY CON- 
SENT TO IT. It seems as if they were the devil's tram- 
peters, sent out to scatter dismay throughout the ranks of 
God's elect. 

3. A revival will cease whenever Christians become mechan- 
ical in their attempts to promote it. When their faith is strong, 
and their hearts are warm and mellow, and their prayers full 
of holy emotion, and their words with power, then the work 
goes on. But when their prayers begin to be cold and with- 
out emotion, and their deep-toned feeling is gone, and they 
begin to labor mechanically, and to use words without feeling, 
then the revival will cease. 

4. The revival will cease whenever Christians get the idea 
that the work will go on ivithout their aid. The church are co- 
workers with God in promoting a revival, and the work can 
be carried on just as far as the church will carry it on, and 
no farther. God has been for one thousand eight hundred 

12 



266 HINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

years trying to get the church into the work. He has been 
calling and urging, commanding, entreating, pressing and 
encouraging, to get them to take hold. He has stood all this 
while ready to make bare his arm to carry on the work with 
them. But the church have been unwilling to do their part. 
They seem determined to leave it to God alone to convert the 
world, and say, " If he wants the world converted, let him do 
it." They ought to know that this is impossible. So far as 
we know, neither God nor man can convert the world with- 
out the co-operation of the church. Sinners cannot be con- 
verted without then* own agency, for conversion consists in 
their voluntary turning to God. No more can sinners be 
converted without the appropriate moral influences to turn 
them ; that is, without truth and the reality of things 
brought full before their minds either by direct revelation 
or by men. God cannot convert the world by physical om- 
nipotence, but he is dependent on the moral influence of the 
church. 

5. The work will cease when the church prefer to attend to 
their own concerns rather than God's business, I do not ad- 
mit that men have any business which is properly their own, 
but they think so, and in fact prefer what they consider as 
their own, rather than to work for God. They begin to think 
they cannot afford sufficient time from their worldly employ- 
ments to carry on a revival. And they pretend they are 
obliged to give up attending to religion, and let their hearts 
go out again after the world. And the work must cease, of 
course. 

6. When Christians get proud of their great revival, it will 
cease. I mean those Christians who have before been instru- 
mental in promoting it. It is almost always the case in a re- 
vival, that a part of the church are too proud or too worldly 
to take any part in the work. They are determined to stand 
aloof, and wait, and see what it will come to, and see how it 
will come out. The pride of this part of the church cannot 
stop the revival, for the revival never rested on them. It be- 
gun without them, and it can go on without them. They 
may fold their arms and do nothing but look on and find 
fault ; and still the work may go on. But when that part of 
the church who work, begin to think what a great revival they 
have had, and how they have labored and prayed, and how 
bold and how zealous they have been, and how much good 
they have done, then the work will be likely to decline. Per- 
haps it has been published in the papers what a revival there 
has been in that church, and how much engaged the mem- 



IIIXDEKANCES TO REVIVALS. 267 

bers have been, and they think how high they shall stand in 
the estimation of other churches, all over the land, because 
they have had such a great revival. And so they get puffed 
up, and vain, and then they can no longer enjoy the presence 
of God, and the Spirit withdraws from them, and the revival 
ceases. 

7. The revival will stop when the church gets exhausted by 
labor. Multitudes of Christians commit a great mistake here 
in time of revival. They are so thoughtless, and have so little 
judgment, that they will break up all their habits of living, 
neglect to eat and sleep at the proper hours, and let the ex- 
citement run away with them, so that they overdo their 
bodies, and are so imprudent that they soon become ex- 
hausted, and it is impossible for them to continue in the 
work. Revivals often cease, and declension follows, from 
negligence and imprudence, in this respect, on the part of 
those engaged in carrying them on. 

8. A revival will cease when the church begins to speculate 
about abstract doctrines, which have nothing to do with prac- 
tice. If the church turn off their attention from the things of 
salvation, and go to studying or disputing about abstract 
points, the revival will cease, of course. 

9. When Christians begin to proselyte. When the Baptists 
are so opposed to the Presbyterians, or the Presbyterians to 
the Baptists, or both against the Methodists, or Episcopalians 
against the rest, that they begin to make efforts to get the 
converts to join their church, you soon see the last of the re- 
vival. Perhaps a revival will go on for a time, and all secta- 
rian difficulties are banished, till somebody circulates a book, 
privately, to gain proselytes. Perhaps some over-zealous dea- 
con, or some mischief-making woman, or some proselyting 
minister, can not keep still any longer, and begins to work 
the work of the devil, by attempting to gain proselytes, and 
so stirs up bitterness, and raising a selfish strife, grieves 
away the Spirit, and drives Christians all into parties. No 
more revival there. 

10. When Christians refuse to render to the Lord according 
to the benefits received. This is a fruitful source of religious 
declensions. God has opened the windows of heaven to a 
church, and poured them out a blessing, and then he reason- 
ably expects them to bring in the tithes into his store-house, 
and devise and execute liberal things for Zion ; and lo ! they 
have refused ; they have not laid themselves out accordingly 
to promote the cause of Christ, and so the Spirit has been 
grieved and the blessing withdrawn, and in some instances a 



268 HINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

great reaction has taken place because the church would not 
be liberal, when God has been so bountiful. I have known 
churches who were evidently cursed with barrenness for 
such a course. They had a glorious revival, and afterwards 
perhaps their meeting-house needed repairing, or something 
else was needed which would cost a little money, and they 
refused to do it, and so for their niggardly spirit God gave 
them up. 

11. When the church, in any way, grieve the Holy Spirit 

(1.) When they do not feel their dependence on the Spirit 
Whenever Christians get strong in their own strength, God 
curses their blessings. In many instances, Christians sin 
against their own mercies, because they get lifted up with 
their success, and take the credit to themselves, and do not 
give to God all the glory. As he says, " If ye will not hear, 
and if ye will not lay it to heart, to give glory unto my name, 
saith the Lord of hosts, I will even send a curse upon you, 
and, I will curse your blessings : yea, I have cursed them al- 
ready, because ye do not lay it to heart." There has been a 
great deal of this in this country, undoubtedly. I have seen 
many things that looked like it, in the papers, where there 
seemed a disposition in men to take credit for success in pro- 
moting revivals. There is doubtless a great temptation to 
this, -and it requires the utmost watchfulness, on the part of 
ministers and churches, to guard against it, and not grieve 
the Spirit away by vain-glorying in men. 

(2. ) The Spirit may be grieved by a spirit of boasting of the 
revival. Sometimes, as soon as a revival commences, you will 
see it. blazed out in the newspapers. And most commonly this 
will kill the revival. There was a case in a neighboring State, 
where a revival commenced, and instantly there came out a 
letter from the pastor, telling that he had a revival. I saw 
the letter and said to myself, That is the last we shall hear of 
this revival. And so it was. In a few days, the work totally 
ceased. And such things are not uncommon. I could men- 
tion cases and places, where persons have published such 
things as to puff up the church, and make them so proud that 
little or nothing more could be done for the revival. 

Some, under pretence of publishing things to the praise and 
glory of God, have published things that savored so strongly 
of a disposition to exalt themselves, have made their own 
agency to stand out so conspicuously, as was evidently calcu- 
lated to make an unhappy impression. At the protracted 
meeting held in this church, a year ago last fall, there were 
five hundred hopefully converted, whose names and places of 



IIINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 269 

residence we knew. A considerable number of them joined 
tins church. Many of them united with other churches. 
Nothing was said of this in the papers. I have several times 
been asked why we were so silent upon the subject. I could 
only reply, that there was such a tendency to self -exaltation 
in the churches, that I was afraid to publish anything on the 
subject. Perhaps I erred. But I have so often seen mischief 
done by premature publications, that I thought it best to say 
nothing about it. In the revival in this city, four years ago, 
so much was said in the papers, that appeared like self-exalta- 
tion, that I was afraid to publish. I am not speaking against 
the practice itself, of publishing accounts of revivals. But the 
manner of doing it is of vast importance. If it is done so as 
to excite vanity, it is always fatal to the revival. 

(3. ) So the Spirit is grieved by saying or publishing things 
that are calculated to undervalue the worh of God. "When a 
blessed work of God is spoken lightly of, not rendering to God 
the glory due to his name, the Spirit is grieved. If anything 
is said about a revival, give only the plain and naked facts just 
as they are, and let them pass for what they are worth. 

12. A revival may be expected to cease, when Christians lose 
the spirit of brotherly love. Jesus Christ will not continue with 
people in a revival any longer than they continue in the exer- 
cise of brotherly love. When Christians are in the spirit of a 
revival, they feel this love, and then you will hear them call 
each other brother and sister, very affectionately. But when 
they begin to get cold, they lose this warmth and glow of affec- 
tion for one another, and then this calling brother and sister 
will seem silly and contemptible and they will leave it off. In 
some churches they never call each other so, but where there 
is a revival, Christians naturally do it. I never saw a revival, 
and probably there never was one, in which they did not do 
it. But as soon as this begins to cease, the Spirit of God is 
grieved, and departs from among them. 

13.. A revival will decline and cease, unless Christians are 
frequently re-converted. By this I mean, that Christians, in 
order to keep in the spirit of a revival, commonly need to be 
frequently convicted, and humbled, and broken down before 
God, and re-converted. This is something which many do not 
understand, when we talk about a Christian's being re-con- 
verted. But the fact is that in a revival the Christian's heart 
is liable to get crusted over, and lose its exquisite relish for 
divine things ; his unction and prevalence in prayer abates, 
and then he must be converted over again. It is impossible 
to keep him in such a state as not to do injury to the work, 



270 HINDER ANCES TO REVIVALS. 

unless he pass through such a process every few days. I have 
never labored in revivals in company with any one who would 
keep in the work and be fit to manage a revival continually, 
who did not pass through this process of breaking down as 
often as once in two or three weeks. Revivals decline, com- 
monly, because it is found impossible to make the church feel 
their guilt and their dependence, so as to break down before 
God. It is important that ministers should understand this, 
and learn how to break down the church, and break down 
themselves when they need it, or else Christians will soon be- 
come mechanical in their work, and lose their fervor and their 
power of prevailing with God. This was the process through 
which Peter passed, when he had denied the Saviour, and by 
which breaking down, the Lord prepared him for the great 
work on the day of Pentecost. I was surprised, a few years 
since, to find that the phrase " breaking down" was a stumbling 
block to certain ministers and professors of religion. They laid 
themselves open to the rebuke administered to Nicodemus, 
" Art thou a master in Israel and knowest not these things ? " 
I am confident that until some of them know what it is to be 
"broken down," they will never do much more for the cause 
of revivals. 

14. A revival cannot continue when Christians vM not prac- 
tice self -denial. When the church have enjoyed a revival and 
begin to grow fat upon it, and run into self-indulgence, the 
revival will soon cease. Unless they sympathize with the Son 
of God, who gave up all to save sinners ; unless they are will- 
ing to give up their luxuries, and their ease, and lay them- 
selves out in the work, they need not expect the Spirit of God 
will be poured out upon them. This is undoubtedly one of 
the principal causes of personal declension. Let Christians 
in a revival BEWARE, when they first find an inclina- 
tion creeping upon them, to shrink from self-denial, and to 
give in to one form of self-indulgence after another. It is 
the device of Satan, to bait them off from the work of God, 
and make them dull and gross, and lazy, and fearful, and use- 
less, and sensual, and drive away the Spirit and destroy the 
revival. 

15. A revival will be stopped by controversies about new mea- 
sures. Nothing is more certain to overthrow a revival than 
this. But as my last lecture was on the subject of new mea- 
sures, I need not dwell longer on the subject now. 

16. Revivals can be put down by the continued opposition of 
the Old School, combined with a bad spirit in the New School. If 
those who do nothing to promote revivals continue their op- 



IIIXDEEAXCES TO REVIVALS. 2 7l 

position, and if those who are laboring to promote them allow 
themselves to get impatient, and get into a bad spirit, the revival 
will cease. When the Old School write their letters in the news- 
papers, against revivals or revival mem and the New School write 
letters back again, against them, in an angry, contentious, bitter 
spirit, and get into a jangling controversy revivals will cease. 
LET THEM KEEP ABOUT THEIR WORK, and not talk 
about the opposition, nor preach, nor print about it, If 
others choose to publish their slang and stuff, let the Lord's 
servants keep to their work, and all the writing and slander 
will not stop the revival, while those who are engaged in it 
mind their business, and keep to their work It is astonish- 
ing how far this holds true in fact 

In one place where there was a revival, certain ministers 
formed a combination against the pastor of the church, and a 
plan was set on foot to ruin him, and they actually got him 
prosecuted before his Presbytery, and had a trial that lasted 
six weeks, right in the midst of the revival, and the work still 
went on. The praying members of the church laid them- 
selves out so hi the work, that it continued triumphantly 
throughout the whole scene. The pastor was called off, to 
attend his trial, but there was another minister that labored 
among the people, and the members did not even go to the 
trial, generally, but kept praying and laboring for souls, and 
the revival rode out the storm. In many other places, oppo- 
sition has risen up in the church, but a few humble souls have 
kept at their work, and a gracious God has stretched out his 
naked arm and made the revival go forward in spite of all 
opposition. 

But whenever those who are actively engaged in promoting 
a revival get excited at the unreasonableness and pertinacity 
of the opposition, and feel as if they could not have it so, and 
they lose their patience, and feel as if they must answer their 
cavils and refute their slanders, then they get down into the 
plains of Ono, and the work must cease. 

17. Any diversion of the public mind will hinder a revival. 
AjLything that succeeds in diverting public attention, will put 
a stop to a revivaL In the case I have specified, where the 
minister was put on trial before his Presbytery, the reason 
why it did not ruin the revival was, that the praying mem- 
bers of the church would not suffer themselves to be diverted 
They did not even attend the trial, but kept praying and 
laboring for souls, and so public attention was kept to the 
subject, in spite of all the efforts of the deviL 

But whenever he succeeds in absorbing public attention on 



2*72 HINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

any other subject, he will put an end to the revival. No mat- 
ter what the subject is. If an angel from heaven were to come 
down, and preach, or pass about the streets, it might be the 
worst thing in the world for a revival, for it would turn sin- 
ners all off from their own sins, and turn the church off from 
praying for souls, to follow this glorious being, and gaze upon 
him, and the revival would cease. 

18. Resistance to the Temperance Reformation vnH put a stop 
to revivals in a church. The time has come that it can no 
longer be innocent in a church to stand aloof from this glo- 
rious reformation. The time was when this could be done 
ignorantly. The time has been when ministers and Chris- 
tians could enjoy revivals, notwithstanding ardent spirit was 
used among them. But since light has been thrown upon 
the subject, and it has been found that the use is only inju- 
rious, no church member or minister can be innocent and 
stand neutral in the cause. They must speak out and take 
sides. And if they do not take ground on one side, then in- 
fluence is on the other. Show me a minister that has taken 
ground against the temperance reformation who has had a 
revival. Show me one who now stands aloof from it who 
has a revivaL Show me one who now temporizes upon this 
point who does not come out and take a stand in favor of 
temperance who has a revival. It did not use to be so. But 
now the subject has come up, and has been discussed, and is 
understood, no man can shut his eyes upon the truth. The 
man's hands are BED WITH BLOOD who stands aloof 
from the temperance cause. And can he have a revival ? 

19. Bevivals are hindered when ministers and churches take 
wrong ground in regard to any question involving human rights. 
Take the subject of SLAVERY, for instance. The time was 
when this subject was not before the public mind. John 
Newton continued in the slave trade after his conversion. 
And so had his mind been perverted, and so completely was 
his conscience seared, in regard to this most nefarious traffic, 
that the sinfulness of it never occurred to his thoughts until 
some time after he became a child of God. Had fight been 
poured upon his mind previously to his conversion, he never 
could have been converted without previously abandoning 
this sin. And after his conversion, when convinced of its in- 
iquity, he could no longer enjoy the presence of God, with- 
out abandoning the sin for ever. So, doubtless, many slave 
dealers and slave holders in our own country have been con- 
verted, notwithstanding their participation in this abomina- 
tion, because the sinfulness of it was not apparent to their 



IIINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 273 

minds. So ministers and churches, to a great extent through- 
out the land, have held their peace, and borne no testimony 
against this abominable abomination, existing in the church 
and in the nation. But recently, the subject has come up for 
discussion, and the providence of God has brought it dis- 
tinctly before the eyes of all men. Light is now shed upon 
this subject, as it has been upon the cause of temperance. 
Facts are exhibited, and principles established, and light 
thrown in upon the minds of men, and this monster is drag- 
ged from his horrid den, and exhibited before the church, and 
it is demanded of them, "IS THIS SIN ? " Their testimony 
must be given on this subject. They are God's witnesses. 
They are sworn to tell "the truth, the whole truth, and 
nothing but the truth." It is impossible that their testimony 
should not be given, on one side or the other. Their silence 
can no longer be accounted for upon the principle of igno- 
rance, and that they fyave never had their attention turned to 
the subject. Consequently, the silence of Christians upon 
the subject is virtually saying that they do not consider slavery 
as a sin. The truth is, it is a subject upon which they can- 
not be silent without guilt. The time has come, in the prov- 
idence of God, when every southern breeze is loaded down 
with the cries of lamentation, moxuming and wo. Two mil- 
lions of degraded heathen in our own land stretch their 
hands, all shackled and bleeding, and send forth to the church 
of God the agonizing cry for help. And shall the church, 
in her efforts to reclaim and save the world, deafen her ears 
to this voice of agony and despair ? God forbid. The church 
cannot turn away from this question. It is a question for 
the church and for the nation to decide, and God will push it 
to a decision. 

It is in vain for the churches to resist it for fear of distrac- 
tion, contention, and strife. It is in vain to account it an 
act of piety to turn away the ear from hearing this cry of 
distress. • 

The church must testify, and testify "the truth, the whole 
truth, and nothing but the truth," on this subject, or she is 
perjured, and the Spirit of God departs from her. She is under 
oath to testify, and ministers and churches who do not pro- 
nounce it sin bear false testimony for God. It is doubtless 
true that one of the reasons for the low state of religion at 
the present time is that many churches have taken the wrong 
side on the subject of slavery, have suffered prejudice to pre- 
vail over principle, and have feared to call this abomination 
by its true name. 
12* 



274 HIXDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

20. Another thing that hinders revivals is neglecting the 
claims of missions. If Christians do not feel for the heathen, 
neglect the monthly concert, and confine then* attention to 
their own church, do not even read the Missionary Herald, 
or use any other means to inform themselves on the subject 
of the claims of the world, and reject the light which God is 
throwing before them, and will not do what God calls them 
to do in this cause, the Spirit of God will depart from them. 

21. When a church reject the calls of God upon them for 
educating young men for the ministry, they will hinder and 
destroy a revival. Look at the Presbyterian church, look at 
the 200,000 souls converted within ten years, and means 
enough to fill the world with ministers, and yet the ministry 
is not increasing so fast as the population of our own coun- 
try, and unless something more can be done to provide min- 
isters, we shall become heathen ourselves. The churches do 
not press upon young men the duty o£ going into the min- 
istry. God pours his Spirit on the churches, and converts 
hundreds of thousands of souls, and if then the laborers do 
not come forth into the harvest, what can be expected but 
that the curse of God will come upon the churches, and his 
Spirit will be withdrawn, and revivals will cease. Upon 
this subject no minister, no church should be silent or in- 
active. 

22. Slandering revivals will often put them down. The 
great revival in the days of President Edwards suffered 
greatly by the conduct of the church in this respect. It is to 
be expected that the enemies of God will revile, misrepresent 
and slander revivals. But when the church herself engages 
in this work, and many of her most influential members are 
aiding and abetting in calumniating and misrepresenting a 
glorious work of God, it is reasonable that the Spirit should 
be grieved away. It cannot be denied that this has been 
done^ to a grievous and God-dishonoring extent. It has been 
estimated that in one year, sinc€ this revival commenced, 
one hundred thousand souls were converted to God in the 
United States. This was undoubtedly the greatest number 
that were ever converted in one year, since the world began.* 
It could not be expected that, in an excitement of this ex- 
tent, among human beings, there should be nothing to de- 



* This was in 1831. There have been more extensive revivals since. 
In 1857-8 it was estimated that 50,000 conversions per week occurred 
for six or eight weeks in succession in the northern part of the United 

States. 



HINDER ANCES TO REVIVALS. 275 

plore. To expect perfection in such a work as this, of such 
extent, and earned on by human instrumentality, is utterly 
unreasonable and absurd Evils doubtless did exist and have 
existed. They were to be expected of course, and guarded 
against, as far as possible. And I do not believe the world's 
history can furnish one instance in which a revival, approach- 
ing to this in extent and influence, has been attended with so 
few evils, and so little that is honestly to be deplored. 

But how has this blessed work of God been treated ? Ad- 
mitting all the evils complained of to be real, which is far 
from being true, they would only be like spots upon the disc 
of the glorious sun ; things hardly to be thought of, in com- 
parison of the infinite greatness and excellence of the work. 
And yet how have a great portion of the Presbyterian church 
received and treated this blessed work of God ? At the Gen- 
eral Assembly, that grave body of men that represent the 
Presbyterian Church, in the midst of this great work, instead 
of appointing a day of thanksgiving, instead of praising and 
glorifying God for the greatness of his work, we hear from 
them the voice of rebuke. From the reports that were given 
of the speeches made there, it appears that the house was 
filled with complainings. Instead of devising measures to 
forward the work, their attention seemed to be taken up with 
the comparatively trifling evils that were incidental to it. And 
after much complaining, they absolutely appointed a commit- 
tee, and sent forth a " Pastoral Letter " to the churches, cal- 
culated to excite suspicions, quench the zeal of God's people, 
and turn them off from giving glory to God for the greatness 
of the blessing, to finding fault and carping about the evils. 
When I heard what was done at that General Assembly, when 
I read their speeches, when I saw their pastoral letter, my 
soul was sick, an unutterable feeling of distress came over my 
mind, and I felt that God would " visit " the Presbyterian 
church for conduct like this. And ever since, the glory has 
been departing, and revivals have been becoming less and less 
frequent — less and less powerful.* 

And now I wish it could be known whether those ministers 
who poured out those complainings on the floor of the Gen- 
eral Assembly, and who were instrumental in getting up that 
pastoral letter, have since been blessed in promoting revivals 
of religion — whether the Spirit of God has been upon them, 

* The strange opposition of such men as Dr. Lyman Beecher and 
Mr. Xettleton had much to do with provoking and sustaining this 
opposition. 



216 HINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

and whether their churches can witness that they have an 
unction from the Holy One. 

23. Ecclesiastical difficulties are calculated to grieve away 
the Spirit, and destroy revivals. It has always been the pol- 
icy of the devil to turn off the attention of ministers from 
the work of the Lord to disputes and ecclesiastical litigations. 
President Edwards was obliged to be taken up for a long 
time in disputes before ecclesiastical councils ; and in our 
days, and in the midst of these great revivals of religion, 
these difficulties have been alarmingly and shamefully multi- 
plied. Some of the most efficient ministers in the church 
have been called off from their direct efforts to win souls to 
Christ, to attend day after day, and in some instances 
week after week, to charges preferred against them, or 
their fellow-laborers in the ministry, which could never be 
sustained. 

Look at Philadelphia : what endless and disgraceful jang- 
lings have distracted and disgraced the church of God in that 
city, and through the length and breadth of the land. And 
in the Presbyterian church at large these ecclesiastical diffi- 
culties have produced evils enough to make creation weep. 
Brother Beman was shamefully and wickedly called off from 
promoting revivals, to attend a trial before his own presby- 
tery, upon charges which, if true, were most of them ridicu- 
lous, but which could never be sustained. And since that 
time a great portion of his time has, it would seem necessa- 
rily, been taken up with the adjustment of ecclesiastical dif- 
ficulties. Brother Duffield, of Carlisle, Brother Barnes, of 
Philadelphia, and others of God's most successful ministers, 
have been hindered a considerable part of their time for years 
by these difficulties. Oh, tell it not in Gath ! When will 
those ministers and professors of religion who do little or 
nothing themselves, let others alone, and let them work for 
God? 

24 Another thing by which revivals may be hindered is 
censoriousness on either side, and especially in those who have 
been engaged in carrying forward a revival. It is to be ex- 
pected that the opposers of the work will watch for the halt- 
ing of its friends, and be sure to censure them for all that is 
wrong, and not unfrequently for that which is right in their 
conduct. Especially is it to be expected that many censo- 
rious and unchristian remarks will be made about those that 
are the most prominent instruments in promoting the work. 
This censoriousness on the part of the opposers of the work, 
whether in or out of the church, will not, however, of itself 



HINDER ANCES TO REVIVALS. 211 

put a stop to the revival. "While its promoters keep humble, 
and in a prayerful spirit, while they do not retaliate, but pos- 
sess their souls in patience, while they do not suffer them- 
selves to be diverted, to recriminate, and grieve away the spirit 
of prayer, the work will go forward ; as in the case referred 
to, where a minister was on trial for six weeks in the midst 
of a revival. There the people kept in the dust, and prayed, 
not so much for their minister, for they had left him with 
God, but with strong crying and tears pleading with God 
for sinners. And God heard and blessed them, and the work 
went on. Censoriousness in those who are opposed to the 
work is but little to be dreaded, for they have not the Spirit, 
and nothing depends on them, and they can hinder the work 
only just so far as they themselves have influence personally. 
But the others have the power of the Holy Spirit, and the 
work depends on their keeping in a right temper. If they 
get wrong and grieve away the Spirit, there is no help, the 
work must cease. "Whatever provocation, therefore, the pro- 
moters of this blessed work may have had, if it ceases, the 
responsibility will be theirs. And one of the most alarming 
facts, in regard to this matter, is that in many instances, those 
who have been engaged in carrying forward the work, appear 
to have lost the Spirit. They are becoming diverted, are be- 
ginning to think that the opposition is no longer to be toler- 
ated, and that they must come out and reply in the news- 
papers to what they say. It should be known and univer- 
sally understood, that whenever the friends and promoters of 
this greatest of revivals suffer themselves to be called off to 
newspaper janglings, to attempt to defend themselves, and 
reply to those who write against them, the Spirit of Prayer 
will be entirely grieved away, and the work will cease. 
Nothing is more detrimental to revivals of religion, and so 
it has always been found, that for the promoters of them to lis- 
ten to the opposition, and begin to reply, This was found to 
be true in the days of President Edwards, as you who are 
acquainted with his 'book on Revivals are well aware. 

m. I proceed to mention some things which ought to be 
done, to continue this great and glorious revival of religion, 
which has been in progress for the last ten years. 

1. There should be great and deep repenting s on the part of 
ministers. WE, my brethren, must humble ourselves before 
God. It will not do for us to suppose that it is enough to 
call on the people to repent. We must repent, we must take 
the lead in repentance, and then call on the churches to 
follow. 



278 HINDER ANCES TO REVIVALS. 

Especially must those repent who have taken the lead in 
producing the feelings of opposition and distrust in regard to 
revivals. Some ministers have confined their opposition 
against revivals and revival measures to their own congrega- 
tions, and created such suspicions among their own people 
as to prevent the work from spreading and prevailing among 
them. Such ministers would do well to consider the remarks 
of President Edwards on this subject. 

" If ministers preach never so good doctrine, and are never 
so painful and laborious in their work, yet, if at such a day 
as this, they show to their people, that they are not well- 
affected to this work, but are very doubtful and suspicious of 
it, they will be very likely to do their people a great deal more 
hurt than good ; for the very fame of such a great and ex- 
traordinary work of God, if their people were suffered to be- 
lieve it to be his work, and the example of other towns, to- 
gether with what preaching they might hear occasionally, 
would be likely to have a much greater influence upon the 
minds of their people, to awaken and animate them in re- 
ligion, than all their labors with them ; and besides their 
minister's opinion would not only beget in them a suspicion of 
the work they hear of abroad, w^hereby the mighty hand of 
God that appears in it, loses its influence upon their minds, 
but it will also tend to create a suspicion of everything of 
the like nature, that shall appear among themselves, as being 
something of the same distemper that is to become so epi- 
demical in the land, and that is, in effect, to create a suspi- 
cion of all vital religion, and to put the people upon talking 
against it, and discouraging it, wherever it appears, and 
knocking it in the head as fast as it rises. And we that are 
ministers, by looking on this work, from year to year, with a 
displeased countenance, shall effectually keep the sheep from 
their pasture, instead of doing the part of shepherds to 
them, by feeding them ; and our people had a great deal 
better be without any settled minister at all at such a day as 
this." 

Others have been more public, and aimed at exerting a 
wider influence. Some have wTitten pieces for the public 
papers. Some men in high standing in the church have cir- 
culated letters which never were printed. Others have had 
their letters printed and circulated. There seems to have 
been a system of letter-writing about the country calculated 
to create distrust. In the days of President Edwards, sub- 
stantially the same course was pursued, in view of which he 
says in his work on revivals : 



HIXDERAXCES TO REVIVALS. 279 

" Great care should be taken that the press should be im- 
proved to no purpose contrary to the interests of this work. 
We read that when God fought against Sisera, for the de- 
liverance of his oppressed church, they that handle the pen of 
the writer came to the help of the Lord in that affair. — Judges 
v. 14. Whatever sort of men in Israel they were that were 
intended, yet as the words were indited by a Spirit that had 
a perfect view of all events to the end of the world, and had a 
special eye in this song, to that great event of the deliver- 
ance of God's church, in the tatter days, of which this de- 
liverance of Israel was a type, it is not unlikely that they 
have respect to authors, those that should fight against the 
kingdom of Satan with their pens. Those therefore that 
publish pamphlets to the disadvantage of this work, and 
tending either directly or indirectly to bring it under suspi- 
cion, and to discourage or hinder it, would do well tho- 
roughly to consider whether this be not indeed the work of 
God, and whether, if it be, it is not likely that God will go 
forth as fire, to consume all that stand in his way, and so 
burn up those pamphlets ; and whether there be not danger 
that the fire that is kindled in them will scorch the authors." 

All these must repent. God never will forgive them, nor 
will they ever enjoy his blessing on their preaching, or be 
honored to labor in revivals till they repent. This duty 
President Edwards pressed upon ministers in his day, in the 
most forcible terms. There doubtless have been now, as 
there were then, faults on both sides. And there must be 
deep repentance, and mutual confessions of faults on both 
sides. 

" There must be a great deal done at confessing of faults, 
on both sides ; for undoubtedly many and great are the 
faults that have been committed, in the jangling and confu- 
sions, and mixtures of light and darkness, that have been of 
late. There is hardly any duty more contrary to our corrupt 
dispositions, and mortifying to the pride of man ; but it 
must be done. Repentance of faults is, in a peculiar man- 
ner, a proper duty, when the kingdom of heaven is at hand, 
or when we especially expect or desire that it should come, 
as appears by John the Baptist's preaching. And if God 
does now loudly call upon us to repent, then he also calls 
upon us to to make proper manifestations of our repentance. 
I am persuaded that those that have openly opposed this 
work, or have from time to time spoken lightly of it, cannot 
be excused in the sight of God, without openly confessing 
their fault therein, especially if they be ministers. If they 



280 HINDER ANCES TO REVIVALS. 

have any way, either directly or indirectly, opposed the work, 
or have so behaved in their public performances or private 
conversation, as has prejudiced the minds of their people 
against the work, if hereafter they shall be convinced of the 
goodness and divinity of what they have opposed, they ought 
by no means to palliate the matter, and excuse themselves, 
and pretend that they always thought so, and that it was 
only such and such imprudences that they objected against, 
but they ought openly to declare their conviction, and con- 
demn themselves for what they have done ; for it is Christ 
that they have spoken against, in speaking lightly of, and 
prejudicing others against this work ; yea, worse than that, 
it is the Holy Ghost. And though they have done it igno- 
rantly, and in unbelief, yet when they find out who it is that 
they have opposed, undoubtedly God will hold them bound 
publicly to confess it. 

" And on the other side, if those that have been zealous to 
promote the work, have hi any of the forementioned instances 
openly gone much out of the way, and done that which is 
contrary to Christian rules, whereby they have openly injured 
others, or greatly violated good order, and so done that 
which has wounded religion, they must publicly confess it, 
and humble themselves, as they would gather out the stones, 
and prepare the way of God's people. They who have laid 
great stumbling blocks in others' way, by their open transgres- 
sion, are bound to remove them, by their open repentance" 

There are ministers in our day, I say it not in unkinclness 
but in faithfulness, and I would that I had them all here be- 
fore me while I say it, who seem to have been engaged much 
of their time for years in doing little else than acting and 
talking and writing in such a way as to create suspicion in 
regard to revivals. And I cannot doubt that their churches 
would, as President Edwards says, be better with no minis- 
ter at all, unless they will repent, and regain his blessing. 

2. Those churches which have opposed revivals must humble 
themselves and repent. Churches which have stood aloof or 
hindered the work must repent of their sin, or God will not 
go with them. Look at those churches now, who have been 
throwing suspicion upon revivals. Do they enjoy revivals ? 
Does the Holy Ghost descend upon them, to enlarge them 
and build them up ? There is one of the churches in this 
city, where the session have been publishing in the news- 
papers what they call their " Act and Testimony," calculated 
to excite an unreasonable and groundless suspicion against 
many, ministers who are laboring successfully to promote re- 



IIINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 281 

vivals. And what is the state of that church ? Have they 
had a revival ? Why it appears from the official report to 
the General Assembly, that it has dwindled in one year 
twanty-seven per cent. And all such churches will continue 
to dwindle, in spite of everything else that can be done, un- 
less they repent and have a revival. They may pretend to 
be mighty pious, and jealous for the honor of God, but God 
will not believe they are sincere. And he will manifest his 
displeasure, by not pouring out his Spirit. If I had a voice 
loud enough, I should like to make every one of these 
churches and ministers that have slandered revivals, hear me, 
when I say, that I believe they have helped to bring the pall 
of death over the church, and that the curse of God is on 
them already, and will remain unless they repent. God has 
already sent leanness into their souls, and many of them 
know it. 

3. Those who have been engaged in promoting the ivork must 
also repent. Whatever they have done that was wrong must 
be repented of, or revivals will not return as in days past. 
Whenever a wrong spirit has been manifested, or they have 
got irritated and provoked at the opposition, and lost their 
temper, or mistaken Christian faithfulness for hard words 
and a wrong spirit, they must repent. Those who are op- 
posed could never stop a revival alone, unless those who pro- 
mote it get wrong. So we must repent if we have said things 
that were censorious, or proud, or arrogant, or severe. Such 
a time as this is no time to stand justifying ourselves. Our 
first call is to repent. Let each one repent of his own sins, 
and not fall out, and quarrel about who is most to blame. 

4. The church must take right ground in regard to politics. Do 
not suppose, now, that I am going to preach a political ser- 
mon, or that I wish to have you join and get up a Christian 
party in politics. No, I do not believe in that. But the time 
has come that Christians must vote for honest men, and take 
consistent ground in politics, or the Lord will curse them. 
They must be honest men themselves, and instead of voting 
for a man because he belongs to their party, Bank or Anti- 
Bank, Jackson, or Anti-Jackson, they must find out whether 
he is honest and upright, and fit to be trusted. They must 
let the world see that the church will uphold no man in 
office, who is known to be a knave, or an adulterer, or a Sab- 
bath-breaker, or a gambler, or a drunkard. Such is the 
spread of intelligence and the facility of communication in 
our country, that every man can know for whom he gives his 
vote. And if he will give his vote only for honest men, the 



282 HINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

country will be obliged to have upright rulers. All parties 
will be compelled to put up honest men as candidates. 
Christians have been exceedingly guilty in this matter. But 
the time has come when they must act differently, or God 
will curse the nation, and withdraw his spirit. As on the 
subject of slavery and temperance, so on this subject, the 
church must act right or the country will be ruined. God 
cannot sustain this free and blessed country, which we love 
and pray for, unless the church will take right ground. Pol- 
itics are a part of religion in such a country as this, and 
Christians must do their duty to the country as a part of their 
duty to God. It seems sometimes as if the foundations of 
the nation were becoming rotten, and Christians seem to act 
as if they thought God did not see what they do in politics. 
But I tell you, he does see it, and he will bless or curse this 
nation, according to the course they take. 

5. The churches must take right grounds on the subject of sla- 
very. And here the question arises, what is right ground ? 
And First I will state some things that should be avoided. 

(1.) First of all, a bad spirit should be avoided. Nothing 
is more calculated to injure religion, and to injure the slaves 
themselves, than for Christians to get into an angry contro- 
versy on the subject. It is a subject upon which there needs 
to be no angry controversy among Christians. Slave-holding 
professors, like rum-selling professors, may endeavor to justi- 
fy themselves, and may be angry with those who press their 
consciences, and call upon them to give up their sins. Those 
proud professors of religion who think a man to blame, or 
think it is a shame to have a black skin, may allow their pre- 
judices so far to prevail, as to shut their ears, and be dis- 
posed to quarrel with those who urge the subject upon them. 
But I repeat it, the subject of slavery is a subject upon which 
Christians, praying men, need not and must not differ. 

(2.) Another thing to be avoided is an attempt to take neu- 
tral ground on this subject. Christians can no more take 
neutral ground on this subject, since it has come up for dis- 
cussion, than they can take neutral ground on the subject of 
the sanctification of the Sabbath. It is a great national sin. 
It is a sin of the church. The churches by their silence, and 
by permitting slaveholders to belong to their communion, 
have been consenting to it. All denominations have been 
more or less guilty, although the Quakers have of late years 
washed their hands of it. It is in vain for the churches to 
pretend it is merely a political sin. I repeat it, it is the sin 
of the church, to which all denominations have consented. 



HINDER ANCES TO REVIVALS. 283 

They have virtually declared that it is lawful. The very fact 
of suffering slaveholders quietly to remain in good standing 
in their churches, is the strongest and most public expression 
of their views that it is not sin. For the church, therefore, 
to pretend to take neutral ground on the subject, is perfectly 
absurd. The fact is that she is not "on neutral ground at all. 
While she tolerates slaveholders in her communion SHE 
JUSTIFIES THE PEACTICE. And as well might an ene- 
my of God pretend that he was neither saint nor sinner, that 
he was going to take neutral ground, and pray " good Lord 
and good devil," because he did not know which side would 
be most popular. 

(3.) Great care should be taken to avoid a censorious S2)irit 
on both sides. It is a subject on which there has been, and 
probably will be for some time to come, a difference of opinion 
among Christians, as to the best method of disposing of the 
question. And it ought to be treated with great forbearance 
on both sides. A denunciatory spirit, impeaching each other's 
motives, is unchristian, calculated to grieve the Spirit of God, 
and to put down revivals, and is alike injurious to the church, 
and to the slaves themselves. 

In the second place, I will mention several things, that in 
my judgment the church are imperatively called upon to do, 
on this subject : 

(1.) Christians of all denominations, should lay aside pre- 
judice and inform themselves on this subject, without any de- 
lay. Vast multitudes of professors of religion have indulged 
prejudice to such a degree, as to be unwilling to read and 
hear, and come to a right understanding of the subject. But 
Christians cannot pray in "this state of mind. I defy any one 
to possess the spirit of prayer, while he is too prejudiced to 
examine this, or any other question of duty. If the light did 
not shine, Christians might remain in the dark upon this 
point, and still possess the spirit of prayer. But if they re- 
fuse to come to the light, they cannot pray. Now I call upon 
all you who are here present, and who have not examined 
this subject because you were indisposed to examine it, to 
say whether you have the spirit of prayer. Where ministers, 
individual Christians, or whole churches, resist truth upon 
this point now, when it is so extensively diffused and before 
the public mind, I do not believe they will or can enjoy a re- 
vival of religion. 

(2.) Writings, containing temperate and judicious discus- 
sions on this subject, and such developments of facts as are 
before the public, should be quietly and extensively circulated, 



284 HINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

and should be carefully and prayerfully examined by the 
whole church. I do not mean by this, that the attention of 
the church should be so absorbed by this, as to neglect the 
main question, of saving souls in the midst of them. I do 
not mean that such premature movements on this subject 
should be made, as to astound the Christian community, and 
involve them in a broil ; but that praying men should act 
judiciously, and that, as soon as sufficient information can 
be diffused through the community, the churches should 
meekly, but firmly take decided ground on the subject, and 
express before the whole nation and the world, their abhor- 
rence of this sin. 

The anti-masonic excitement which prevailed a few years 
since, made such desolations in the churches, and produced 
for a time so much alienation of feeling and ill will among 
ministers and people, and the first introduction of this sub- 
ject has been attended with such commotions, that many 
good ministers, who are themselves entirely opposed to slav- 
ery, dread to introduce the subject among their people, 
through fear that their churches have not religion enough to 
take it up, and consider it calmly, and decide upon it in the 
spirit of the Gospel. I know there is danger of this. But 
still the subject must be presented to the churches. And if 
introduced with discretion, and with great prayer, there are 
very few churches that have enjoyed revivals, and that are at 
the present time anywhere near a revival spirit, which may 
not be brought to receive the truth on this subject. Let their 
be no mistake here. "William Morgan's expose of freemasonry 
was published in 1826. The consequent excitement and dis- 
cussion continued until 1830. In the mean time the churches 
had very generally borne their testimony against freemasonry, 
and resolved that they could not fellowship adhering masons. 
As a consequence the Masonic Lodges generally disbanded 
and gave up their charters. There was a general stampede 
of professed Christians from the lodges. This prepared the 
way, and in 1830, the greatest revival the world had then 
ever seen commenced in the center of the anti-masonic region, 
and spread over the whole field where the church action had 
been taken until its converts numbered 100,000 souls. 

Perhaps no church in this country has had a more severe 
trial upon this subject than this. They were a church of 
young and for the most part inexperienced Christians. And 
many circumstances conspired, in my absence, to produce con- 
fusion and wrong feeling among them. But so far as I am 
now acquainted with the state of feeling hi this church, I 



HINDEKANCES TO REVIVALS. 285 

know of no ill will among them on this subject. The Lord 
has blessed us, the Spirit has been distilled upon us, and con- 
siderable numbers added to our communion every month 
since my return. There are doubtless in this church those 
who feel on this subject in very different degrees. And yet I 
can honestly say that I am not aware of the least difference 
in sentiment among them. We have from the beginning, pre- 
vious to my going on my foreign tour, taken the same 
ground on the subject of slavery that we have on temper- 
ance. We have excluded slaveholders and all concerned in 
the traffic from our communion. By some out of this church 
this course has been censured as unwarrantable and unchari- 
table, and I would by no means make my own judgment, or 
the example of this church, a rule for the government of 
other ministers and churches. Still, I conscientiously believe 
that the time is not far distant when the churches will be 
united in this expression of abhorrence against this sin. If I 
do not baptize slavery by some soft and Christian name, if I 
call it SIN, both consistency and conscience conduct to the 
inevitable conclusion, that while this sin is persevered in, its 
perpetrators cannot be fit subjects for Christian communion 
and fellowship. 

To this it is objected, that there are many ministers in the 
Presbyterian church who are slaveholders. And it is said to 
be very inconsistent that we should refuse to suffer a slave- 
holder to come to our communion, and yet belong to the 
same church with them, sit with them in ecclesiastical bodies, 
and acknowledge them as ministers. To this I answer, that 
I have not the power to deal with those ministers, and cer- 
tainly I am not to withdraw from the church because some of 
its ministers or members are slaveholders. My duty is to be- 
long to the church, even if the devil belong to it. Where I 
have authority, I exclude slaveholders from the communion, 
and I always will as long as I live. But where I have no au- 
thority, if the table of Christ is spread, I will sit down to it, 
in obedience to his commandment, whoever else may sit down 
or stay away. 

I do not mean, by any means, to denounce all those slave- 
holding ministers and professors as hypocrites, and to say 
that they are not Christians. But this I say, that while 
they continue in that attitude, the cause of Christ and of 
humanity demands, that they should not be recognized as 
such, unless we mean to be partakers of other men's sins. 
It is no more inconsistent to exclude slaveholders because 
they belong to the Presbyterian church, than it is to ex- 



286 HINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

elude persons who drink or sell ardent spirits. For there 
are a great many rum-sellers belonging to the Presbyterian 
church. 

I believe the time has come, and although I am no prophet, 
I believe it will be found to have come, that the revival in the 
United States will continue and prevail, no farther and faster 
than the church take right ground upon this subject. The 
church are Grod's witnesses. The fact is that slavery is, pre- 
eminently, the sin of the church. It is the very fact that min- 
isters and professors of religion of different denominations 
hold slaves, which sanctifies the whole abomination, in the 
eyes of ungodly men. Who does not know that on the 
subject of temperance every drunkard in the land will skulk 
behind some rum-selling deacon, or wine-drinking minister ? 
It is the most common objection and refuge of the intem- 
perate, and of moderate drinkers, that it is practised by pro- 
fessors of religion. It is this that creates the imperious neces- 
sity for excluding traffickers in ardent spirit, and rum-drink- 
ers from the communion. Let the churches of all denomina- 
tions speak out on the subject of temperance ; let them close 
their doors against all who have anything to do with the 
death-dealing abomination, and the cause of temperance is tri- 
umphant. A few years would annihilate the traffic. Just so 
with slavery. 

It is the church that mainly supports this sin. Her 
united testimony upon this subject would settle the ques- 
tion. Let Christians of all denominations meekly but firmly 
come forth, and pronounce their verdict ; let them clear 
their communions, and wash their hands of this thing ; let 
them give forth and write on the head and front of this 
great abomination, SIN ! and in three years a public senti- 
ment would be formed that would carry all before it, and 
there would not be a shackled slave, nor a bristling, cruel 
slave-driver in this land. 

Still it may be said, that in many churches, this subject 
cannot be introduced without creating confusion and ill-will. 
This may be. It has been so upon the subject of temper- 
ance, and upon the subject of revivals too. In some 
churches, neither temperance nor revivals can be introduced 
without producing dissension. Sabbath-schools, and mis- 
sionary operations, and everything of the kind have been op- 
posed, and have produced dissensions in many churches. 
But is this a sufficient reason for excluding these subjects ? 
And where churches have excluded these subjects for fear of 
contention, have they been blessed with revivals ? Every- 



HINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 287 

body knows that they have not. But where churches have 
taken firm ground on these subjects, although individuals and 
sometimes numbers have opposed, still they have been 
blessed with revivals. Where any of these subjects are 
carefully and prayerfully introduced ; where they are brought 
forward with a right spirit, and the true relative importance 
is attached to each one of them ; if in such cases, there are 
those who will make disturbance and resist, let the blarne fall 
where it ouglit. There are some individuals, who are themselves 
disposed to quarrel with this subject, who are always ready 
to exclaim, " Do not introduce these things into the church, 
they will create opposition." And if the minister and pray- 
ing people feel it their duty to bring the matter forward, they 
will themselves create a disturbance, and then say, " There, I 
told you so ; now see what your introducing this subject has 
done ; it will tear the church all to pieces." And while 
they are themselves doing all they can to create division, 
they are charging the division upon the subject, and not 
upon themselves. There are some such people in many 
of our churches. And neither Sabbath-schools, nor mis- 
sions, nor revivals, nor anti-slavery, nor anything else that 
honors God or benefits the souls of men, will be carried in 
the churches, without these careful souls being offended 
by it. 

These things, however, have been introduced, and carried, 
one by one, in some churches with more, and others with less 
opposition, and perhaps in some churches with no opposition 
at all. And as true as God is the God of the church, as cer- 
tain as that the world must be converted, this subject must 
be considered and pronounced sin by the church. There 
might, infinitely better, be no church in the world, than that 
she should attempt to remain neutral or give a false testi- 
mony on a subject of such importance as slavery, especially 
since the subject has come up, and it is impossible from the 
nature of the case, that her testimony should not be in the 
scale, on the one side or the other. 

Do you ask, " What shall be done — shall we make it the 
all-absorbing topic of conversation, and divert attention from 
the all-important subject of the salvation of souls in the 
midst of us?" I answer, No. Let a church express her 
opinion upon the subject, and be at peace. So far as I 
know, we are entirely at peace upon this subject. We have 
expressed our opinion ; we have closed our communion 
against slaveholders, and are attending to other things. I 
am not aware of the least unhealthy excitement among us 



288 HINDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

on this subject. And where it has become an absorbing 
topic of conversation in a place, in most instances I believe it 
has been owing to the pertinacious and unreasonable oppo- 
sition of a few individuals against even granting the subject a 
hearing. 

6. If the church wishes to promote revivals, she must sane- 
iify the Sabbath. There is a vast deal of Sabbath-breaking in 
the land. Merchants break it, travellers break it, the Govern- 
ment breaks it. A few years ago an attempt was made in the 
western part of this State, to establish and sustain a Sabbath- 
keeping line of boats and stages. But it was found that the 
church would not sustain the enterprise. Many professors of 
religion would not travel in these stages, and would not have 
their goods forwarded in canal-boats that would be detained 
from travelling on the Sabbath. At one time, Christians 
were much engaged in petitioning Congress to suspend the 
Sabbath mails, and now they seem to be ashamed of it. But 
one thing is most certain, that unless something is done, and 
done speedily, and done effectually, to promote the sanctifi- 
cation of the Sabbath by the church, the Sabbath will go by 
the board, and we shall not only have our mails running on 
the Sabbath, and post-offices open, but by and by our courts 
of justice and halls of legislation will be kept open on the 
Sabbath. And what can the church do, what will this nation 

do, WITHOUT ANY SaBBATH ? 

7. The church must take right ground on the subject of 
Temperance and Moral Eeform, and all the subjects of prac- 
tical morality which come up for decision from time to time. 

There are those in the churches who are standing aloof 
from the subject of Moral Eeform, and who are afraid to have 
anything said in the pulpit against lewdness. On this sub- 
ject the church need not expect to be permitted to take 
neutral ground. In the providence of God, it is up for dis- 
cussion. The evils have been exhibited, the call has been 
made for reform. And what is to reform mankind but the 
truth? And who shall present the truth if not the church 
and the ministry ? Away with the idea that Christians can 
remain neutral and keep still, and yet enjoy the approbation 
and blessing of God. 

In all such cases, the minister who holds his peace is 
counted among those on the other side. Everybody knows 
that it is so in a revival. It is not necessary for a person to 
rail out against the work. If he only keeps still and takes 
neutral ground, the enemies of the revival will all consider 
him as on their side. So on the subject of temperance. It 



HINDER ANCES TO REVIVALS. 289 

is not needful that a person should rail at the cold-water so- 
ciety, in order to be on the best terms with drunkards and 
moderate drinkers. Only let him plead for the moderate use 
of wine, only let him continue to drink it as a luxury, and all 
the drunkards account him on their side. If he refuses to 
give his influence to the temperance cause, he is claimed of 
course by the other side as a friend. On all these subjects, 
when they come up, the churches and ministers must take 
the right ground, and take it openly and stand to it, and car- 
ry it through, if they expect to enjoy the blessing of God in 
revivals. They must cast out from their communions such 
members, as in contempt of the light that is shed upon them, 
continue to drink or traffic in ardent spirits. 

8. There must be more done for all the great objects of Chris- 
tian benevolence. There must be much greater efforts for the 
cause of missions, and education, and the Bible, and all the 
other branches of religious enterprise, or the church will dis- 
please God. Look at it. Think of the mercies we have re- 
ceived, of the wealth, numbers and prosperity of the church. 
Have we rendered unto God according to the benefits we 
have received, so as to show that the church is bountiful and 
willing to give their money and to work for God ? No. Far 
from it. Have we multiplied our means and enlarged our 
plans, in proportion as the church has increased ? Is God 
satisfied with what has been done, or has he reason to be ? 
Such a revival as has been enjoyed by the churches of America 
for the last ten years ! We ought to have done ten times as 
much as we have for missions, Bibles, education, tracts, free 
churches, and in all the ways designed to promote religion 
and save souls. If the churches do not wake up on this sub- 
ject, and lay themselves out on a larger scale, they may ex- 
pect the revival in the United States will cease. 

9. If Christians in the United States expect revivals to 
spread, and prevail, till the world is converted, they must give J 
up writing letters and publishing pieces calculated to excite 
suspicion and jealousy in regard to revivals, and must take 
hold of the work themselves. If the whole church as a body 
had gone to work ten years ago, and continued it as a few 
individuals, whom I could name, have done, there would not 
now have been an impenitent sinner in the land. The mil- 
lennium would have fully come in the United States before this 
day. Instead of standing still, and writing letters from Berk- 
shire, let ministers who think we are going wrong, just buckle 
on the harness and go forward, and show us a more excellent 
way. Let them teach us by their example how to do better. 

13 



290 HINDER ANCES TO REVIVALS. 

I do not deny that some may have made mistakes, and com- 
mitted errors. I do not deny that there are many things 
which are wrong done in revivals by some persons. But is 
that the way to correct them, brethren ? So did not Paul. 
He corrected his brethren by telling them kindly that he would 
show them a more excellent way. Let our brethren take hold 
and go forward. Let us hear the cry from all their pulpits. 
To the woke. Let them lead on, where the Lord will go with 
them and make bare his arm, and I, for one, will follow. 
Only let them GO ON, and let us have the United States con- 
verted to God, and let all minor questions cease. 

If not, and if revivals do cease in this land, the ministers 
and churches will be guilty of all the blood of all the souls 
that shall go to hell in consequence of it. There is no need 
that the work should cease. If the church will do all her 
duty, the millennium may come in this country in three years. 
But if this writing letters is to be kept up, filling the country 
with suspicions and jealousies, if it is to be always so, that 
two-thirds of the church will hang back and do nothing but 
find fault in time of revival, the curse of God will be on this 
nation, and that before long. 

REMARKS. 

1. It is high time there should be great searching s of heart 
among Christians and ministers. Brethren, this is no time to 
resist the truth, or to cavil and find fault because the truth is 
spoken out plainly. It is no time to recriminate or to strive, 
but we must search our own hearts, and humble ourselves be- 
fore God. 

2. We must repent and forsake our sins, and amend our 
ways and our doings, or the revival will cease. Our ecclesi- 
astical difficulties MUST CEASE, and all minor differences 
must be laid aside and given up, to unite in promoting the 
great interests of religion. If not, revivals will cease from 
among us, and the blood of lost millions will be found in our 
skirts. 

^J > If the church would do all her duty, she would soon com- 
plete the triumph of religion in the world. But if this Act 
and Testimony warfare is to be kept up, and this system of 
espionage, and insinuation and denunciation, not only will 
revivals cease, but the blood of millions who will go to hell 
before the church will get over the shock, will be found in the 
skirts of the men who have got up and carried on this dread- 
ful contention* 



HIXDERAXCES TO REVIVALS. 291 

4. Those who have circulated slanderous reports in regard 
to revivals, must repent. A great deal has been said about 
heresy, and about some men's denying the Spirit's influence, 
which is wholly groundless, and has been made up out of 
nothing. And those who have made up the reports, and those 
who have circulated them against their brethren, must repent 
and pray to God that they may receive his forgiveness. 

5. We see the constant tendency there is in Christians to de- 
clension and backsliding. This is true in all converts of all 
revivals. Look at the revival hi President Edwards' day. 
The work went on till 30,000 souls had been converted, and 
by this time so many ministers and Christians got in such a 
state, by writing books and pamphlets, on one side and the 
other, that they carried all by the board, and the revival 
ceased. Those who had opposed the work grew obstinate 
and violent, and those who promoted it lost their meekness, 
and got ill-tempered, and were then driven into the very evils 
that had been falsely charged upon them. 

And now, what shall we do ? This great and glorious work 
of God seems to be indicating a decline. The revival is not 
dead — blessed be God for that — it is not dead ! No, we hear 
from all parts of the land that Christians are reading on the 
subject and inquiring about the revival. In some places there 
are now powerful revivals. And what shall we do, to lift up 
the standard, to move this entire nation and turn all this 
great people to the Lord? We must DO EIGHT. We must 
all have a better spirit, we must get down in the dust, we 
must act unitedly, we must take hold of this great work with 
all our hearts, and then God will bless us, and the work will 
go on. 

What is the condition of this nation ? No doubt, God is 
holding the rod of WAK over the heads of this nation. He 
is waiting before he lets loose his judgments, to see whether 
the church will do right. The nation is under his displeasure, 
because the church has conducted in such a manner with re- 
spect to revivals. And now suppose war should come, where 
would be our revivals ? How quickly would war swallow up 
the revival spirit. The spirit of war is anything but the spirit 
of revivals. Who will attend to the claims of religion, when 
the public mind is engrossed by the all-absorbing topic of 
war. See now, how this nation is, all at once, brought upon 
the brink of war. God brandishes his blazing sword over 
our heads. Will the church repent? It is THE CHURCH 
that God chiefly has in view. How shall we avoid the curse 
of war ? Only by a reformation in the church. It is in vain 



292 HIXDERANCES TO REVIVALS. 

to look to politicians to avert war. Perhaps they would gen- 
erally be in favor of war. Very likely the things they would 
do to avert it would run us right into it. If the church will 
not feel, will not awake, will not act, where shall we look for 
help? If the church absolutely will not move, will not trem- 
ble in view of the just judgments of God hanging over our 
heads, we are certainly nigh unto cursing, as a nation. 

6. Whatever is done must be done quickly. The scale is on 
a poise. If we do not go forward, we must go back. Things 
cannot remain as they are. If the church do not come up, if 
we do not have a more powerful revival than we have had, 
very soon we shall have none at all. We have had such a 
great revival, that now small revivals do not interest the pub- 
lic mind. You must act as individuals. Do your own duty. 
You have a responsibility. Repent quickly. Do not wait till 
another year. Who but God knows what will be the state of 
these churches, if things go on another year without a great 
and general revival of religion ? . 

7. It is common, when things get all wrong in the church, 
for each individual to find fault with the church, and with his 
brethren, and overlook his own share of the blame. Do not 
let any one spend his time in finding fault with that abstract 
thing, "The Church." But as individual members of the 
church of Christ, let each one act, and act right, and get 
down in the dust, and never speak proudly, or censoriously. 
GO FORWARD. Who would leave such a work, and go to 
writing letters, and go down into the plain of Ono, and see if 
all these petty disputes cannot be adjusted, and let the work 
cease. Let us mind our work, and let the Lord take care of 
the rest. Do our duty, and leave the issue to God. 

Since these lectures were delivered great progress has been 
made in all benevolent enterprises in this country. Time has 
settled the question of the purity and inestimable value of 
those revivals, against which so much mistaken opposition ex- 
isted in the Presbyterian church. It is now known that the 
great and disastrous reaction predicted by opposers has not 
been witnessed. It must now be admitted that the converts 
of those revivals have composed the strength of the churches, 
and that their Christian influence has been felt throughout 
the land. No revivals have ever existed the power and purity 
of which have been more thoroughly established by time and 
experience, than that great and blessed work of God, against 
which such a storm of opposition was raised. The opposi- 
tion was evidently a great mistake. Let it not be said that 



HIXDEKAXCES TO REVIVALS. 293 

the opposition was demanded by the great evils attending 
that work, and that those evils and errors were arrested and 
corrected by that opposition. The fact is that the supposed 
errors and evils that were made the justification of the oppo- 
sition, never existed to any such extent as to justify alarm or 
opposition. I have written a narrative of those revivals, in 
which I have considered this question more fully. The 
churches did take hold of temperance and other branches of 
reform to such an extent as to avoid those evils against which 
they were warned. Upon the question of slavery the church 
was too late in her testimony to avoid the war. But the 
slaveholders were much alarmed and exasperated by the con- 
stantly growing opposition to their institution throughout all 
that region of the north where revival influences had been 
felt. They took up arms to defend and perpetuate the 
abomination, and by so doing abolished it. 



LECTUKE XVI. 

THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

Text.— Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth, as touching 
anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in hea- 
ven. — Matthew xviii. 19. 

Some weeks since, I used this text, in preaching on the sub- 
ject of prayer meetings. At present I design to enter more 
into the spirit and meaning of the text. The evident design 
of our Lord in this text was to teach the importance and in- 
fluence of union in prayer and effort to promote religion. He 
states the strongest possible case by taking the number two, 
as the least number between whom there can be an agreement, 
and says that "where two of you are agreed on earth, as 
touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for 
them of my Father which is in heaven/' It is the fact of 
their agreement, upon which he lays the stress, and mention- 
ing the number two, appears to have been designed merely 
to afford encouragement to the smallest number between 
whom there can be an agreement. But what are we to under- 
stand by being " agreed as touching" the things we shall ask ? 
I will answer this question under the two following heads : 

I. By showing that we are to be "agreed" in prayer, 

II. We are to agree in everything that is essential to ob- 
taining the blessing that we seek. 

I. In order to come within this promise, we are to be 
agreed in prayer. This is particularly taught in the text. 
That is, 

1. We should agree in our desires for the object. It is ne- 
cessary to have desires for the object, and to be agreed in those 
desires. Very often individuals pray in ivords for the same 
thing, when they are by no means agreed in desiring that 
thing. Nay, perhaps some of them, in their hearts desire 
the very opposite. People are called on to pray for an object, 
and they all pray for it in words, but God knows they often 
do not desire it, and perhaps he sees that the hearts of some 
may, all the while, be resisting the prayer. 

2. We must agree in the motive from which we desire the 

(294) 



THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 295 

object. It is not enough that our desires for an object should 
be the same, but the reason why must be the same. An in- 
dividual may desire a revival, for the glory of God and the 
salvation of sinners. Another member of the church may 
also desire a revival, but from very different motives. Some, 
perhaps, desire a revival in order to have the congregation 
built up and strengthened, so as to make it more easy for 
them to pay their expenses in supporting the Gospel. Another 
desires a revival for the sake of having the church increased 
so as to be more numerous and more respectable. Others 
desire a revival because they have been opposed or evil spoken 
of, and they wish to have their enemies know that whatever 
they may think or say, God blesses them. Sometimes people 
desire a revival from mere natural affection, so as to have 
their friends converted and saved. If they mean to be so 
united in prayer as to obtain a blessing, they must not only 
desire the blessing, and be agreed in desiring it, but they must 
also agree in desiring it for the same reasons. 

3. We must be agreed in desiring it for good reasons. These 
desires must not only be united, and from the same motives, 
but they must be from good motives. The supreme motive 
must be to honor and glorify God. People may even desire 
a revival, and agree in desiring it, and agree in the motives, 
and yet if these motives are not good, God will not grant their 
desires. Thus parents may be agreed in prayer for the con- 
version of their children, and may have the same feelings and 
the same motives, and yet if they have no higher motives than 
because they are their children, their prayers will not be 
granted. They are agreed in the reason, but it is not the 
right reason. 

In like manner, any number of persons might be agreed in 
their desires and motives, but if their motives are selfish, their 
being agreed in them will only make them more offensive to 
God. " How is it that ye have agreed together to tempt the 
Spirit of the Lord ?" I have seen a great deal of this, where 
churches have been engaged in prayer for an object, and their 
motives were evidently selfish. Sometimes they are engaged 
in praying for a revival, and you would think by their earnest- 
ness and union that they would certainly move God to grant 
the blessing, till you find out the reason. And what is it ? 
Why, they see their congregation is about to be broken up, 
unless something can be done. Or they see some other de- 
nomination gaining ground, and there is no way to counter- 
act them but by having a revival in their church. And all 
then* praying is only an attempt to get the Almighty in to 



296 THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

help them out of their difficulty, and is purely selfish and 
offensive to God. A woman in Philadelphia, was invited to 
attend a female prayer meeting at a certain place. She in- 
quired what they met there for, and for what they were going 
to pray ? She was answered that they were going to pray for 
the outpouring of the Spirit upon the city. "Well," said she, 
" I shall not go ; if they were going to pray for our congrega- 
tion I would go, but I am not going there to pray for other 
churches !" Oh, what a spirit ! 

I have had a multitude of letters and requests that I should 
visit such and such places, and endeavor to promote a revival, 
and many reasons have been urged why I should go, but when 
I came to weigh their reasons, I have sometimes found every 
one of them selfish. And God would look upon every one 
with abhorrence. 

In prayer meetings, how often do we hear people offer such 
reasons why they desire such and such blessings, as are not 
right in the sight of God. Such reasons, that if they are the 
true ones, and if Christians are actually excited by those rea- 
sons, it would render their prayers not acceptable to God, 
because their motive was not right. 

There are a great many things often said in favor of the 
cause of missions, which are of this character, appealing to 
wrong motives. How often are we told of six hundred mil- 
lions of heathens, who are in danger of going to hell, and how 
little is said of the guilt of six hundred millions engaged and 
banded together as rebels against God, or of the dishonor and 
contempt poured upon God our Maker by such a world of 
outlaws. Now I know that God refers to those motives which 
appeal to our mere natural sympathies, and compassion, and 
uses them, but always in subordination to his glory. If these 
lower motives are placed foremost, it must always produce a 
defective piety and zeal, and a great deal that is false. Until 
the church will look at the dishonor done to God, little will 
be done. It is this which must be made to stand out before 
the world, it is this which must be deeply felt by the church, 
it is this which must be fully exhibited to sinners, before the 
world can £ver be converted. 

Parents never agree in praying for the conversion of their 
children in such a way as to have their prayers answered, un- 
til they feel that their children are rebels. Parents often pray 
very earnestly for their children because they wish God to 
save them, and they almost think hard of God if he does not 
save their children. But if they would have their prayers 
prevail, they must come to take God's part against their chil- 



THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 297 

dren, even though for their perverseness and incorrigible 
wickedness he should be obliged to send them to hell. I 
knew a woman who was very anxious for the salvation of her 
son, and she used to pray for him with agony, but still he re- 
mained impenitent, until at length she became convinced that 
her prayers and agonies had been nothing but the fond yearn- 
ings of parental feeling, and were not dictated at all by a just 
view of her son's character as a wilful and wicked rebel against 
God. And there was never any impression made on his mind 
until she was made to take strong ground against him as a 
rebel, and to look on him as deserving to be sent to hell. And 
then he was converted. The reason was, she never before 
was influenced by the right motive in prayer, desiring his sal- 
vation with a supreme regard to the glory of God. 

4. If we would be so united as to prevail in prayer, we must 
agree in faith. That is, we must concur in expecting the 
blessing prayed for. We must understand the reason why it 
is to be expected, we must see the evidence on which faith 
ought to rest, and must absolutely believe that the blessing 
will come, or we do not bring ourselves within the promise. 
Faith is always understood as an indispensable condition of 
prevailing prayer. If it is not expressed in any particular 
case, it is always implied, for no prayer can be effectual but 
that which is offered in faith. And in order that united prayer 
may prevail, there must be united faith. 

5. So, again, we must be agreed as to the time token we de- 
sire the blessing to come. If two or more agree in desiring a 
particular blessing, and one of them desires to have it come 
now, while others are not ready to have it quite yet, it is plain 
they are not agreed. They are not united in regard to one 
essential point. If the blessing is to come in answer to their 
united prayer, it must come as they prayed for it. And if it 
comes, it must be at some time. But if they disagree as to 
the time when they will have it, plainly it can never come in 
answer to their prayer. 

Suppose a church should undertake to pray for a revival, 
and should be all agreed in desiring a revival, but not as to 
the time when it shall be. Suppose some wish to have the 
revival come now, and are all prepared, and their hearts 
waiting for the Spirit of God to come down, and are willing 
to give time and attention and labor to it NOW ; but others 
are not quite ready, they have something else to attend to at 
present, some worldly object which they want to accomplish, 
some piece of business in hand and want just to finish this 
thing, and then — but they cannot possibly find time to attend 
13* 



298 TUE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

to it now, they are not prepared to humble themselves, to 
search their hearts and break up their fallow ground, and put 
themselves in a posture to receive the blessing. Is it not plain 
that here is no real union, for they are not agreed in that 
which is essential ? While one part are praying that the re- 
vival may come now, the others are praying with equal ear 
nestness that it may not come now. 

Suppose the question were now put to this church, whether 
you are agreed in praying for a revival of religion here ? Do 
yofi. all desire a revival, and would you all like to have it come 
now ? Would you be heartily agreed now to break down in 
the dust, and open your hearts to the Holy Ghost if he 
should come to-night ? I do not ask what you would say, if 
I should propose the question. Perhaps if I should put it to 
you now, you would all rise up and vote that you were agreed 
in desiring a revival, and agreed to have it now. You know 
how you ought to feel and what you ought to say, and you 
know you ought to be ready for a revival now. But, I ask, 
would GOD see it to be so in your hearts, that you are agreed 
on this point ? Has there been a time, since I came back 
from the country, that this church were all agreed in desiring 
and praying for a revival, and in wishing to have it come 
now ? Have any two of you agreed on this point, and prayed 
accordingly ? If not, when will you be agreed to pray for a 
revival ? And if this church cannot be agreed among your- 
selves, how can you expect a revival ? It is of no use for you 
to take the outward attitude, and stand up here and say you 
are agreed, when God reads the heart, and sees that you are 
not agreed. Here is the promise — " Again I say unto you, 
That if two of you shall agree on earth, as touching anything 
that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father 
which is in heaven." Now this is either true, or it is false. 
Which ground will you take ? If it is true, then it is true 
that you are not agreed, and never have been, except in those 
cases where you have had a revival. 

But we must agree not only upon a time, but it must be 
the present time, or we are not agreed in everything essential 
to the work. Unless we agree to have the revival now, we 
shall not now use the means. But until the means are used, 
it cannot come. It is plain, then, that we must be agreed 
upon the present time, that is, we are not agreed in the sense 
of the text, until we agree that now we will have the bless- 
ing, and conduct accordingly. To agree upon a future time 
is of no use, for when that future time comes, we must then 
be agreed upon that present time, and use means accordingly, 



THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 299 

so that yon see you are never properly agreed until you 
agree that now is the time. 

II. We are to agree in everything that is essential to ob- 
taining the blessing that we seek. 

You see the language of the text, "If two of you shall 
agree as touching anything that they shall ask." Many people 
seem to read it as if it referred merely to an agreement in 
asking, and they understand it to promise, that whenever two 5 
are agreed in asking for any blessing, it shall be given. But I 
Christ says there must be an agreement "as touching " the' 
thing prayed for. That is, the agreement or union must 
comprise everything that is essential to the bestowment and 
reception of the blessing. 

1. If Christians would enjoy the benefits of this promise 
in praying for a revival, they must be agreed in believing revi- 
vals of religion to be a reality. There are many individuals, 
even in the church, who do not in their hearts believe that 
the revivals which take place are the work of God. Some of 
them may pray in words for an outpouring of the Spirit and 
a revival of religion, while in their hearts they doubt whether 
there are any such things known in modern times. In united 
prayer there must be no hypocrisy. 

2. They must agree in feeling the necessity of revivals. 
There are some who believe in the reality of revivals, as a 
work of God, while at the same time they are unsettled as to 
the necessity of having them in order to the success of the 
Gospel They think there is a real work of God in revivals, 
but after all, perhaps it is quite as well to have sinners con- 
verted and brought into the church in a more quiet and 
gradual way, and without so much excitement. Whenever 
revivals are abroad in the land, and prevail, and are popular, 
they may appear in favor of them, and may put up their cold 
prayers for a revival, while at the same time they would be 
sorry on the whole to have a revival come among them. They 
think it so much safer and better to indoctrinate the people, 
and spread the matter before them in a calm way, and so 
bring them in gradually, and not run the risk of having 
animal feeling or wild-fire in their congregations. 

3. They must be agreed in regard to the importance of revi- 
vals. Men are not blessed with revivals, in answer to prayers 
that are not half in earnest. They must feel the infinite; in> 
portance of a revival before they will pray so as to prevail. 
Blessings of this kind are not granted but in answer to 
such prayers as arise from a sense of their importance. As 
I have shown before, when preaching on the subject of pre- 



300 THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

vailing prayer, it is when men desire the blessing with UN- 
UTTERABLE AGONY, that they offer such prayer as will 
infallibly prevail with God. Those who feel less of the im- 
portance of a revival may pray for it in words, but they will 
never have the blessing. But when a church has been united 
in prayer, and really felt the importance of a revival, they 
never have failed of having one. I do not believe a case can 
be found of such a church being turned empty away. Such 
an agreement, when sincere, will secure an agreement also on 
all other subjects that are indispensable. 

4. They must be agreed also in having correct scriptural no- 
tions about several things connected with revivals. 

(1.) The necessity of divine agency to produce a revival. It 
is not enough that they all hold this in theory, and pray for 
it in words. They must fully understand and deeply feel this 
necessity, they must realize their entire dependence on the 
Spirit of God, or the whole will fail. 

(2.) Why divine agency is necessary. There must be an 
agreement on correct principles in regard to the reason that 
divine agency is so indispensable. If they get wrong ideas 
on this point, they will be hindered. If Christians get the 
idea that this necessity of divine influence lies in the inability 
of sinners, or if they feel as if God was under obligation to 
give the Holy Spirit, in order to make sinners able to obey 
the Gospel, they insult God, and their prayers will not avail 
For in that case they must feel that it is a mere matter of 
common justice for God to pour out his Spirit, before he can 
justly require Christians to work, or sinners to repent. 

Suppose a church get the idea that sinners are poor, unfor- 
tunate creatures, who come into the world with such a nature 
that they can not help sinning, and that sinners are just as 
unable to repent and believe the Gospel as they are to fly to 
the moon, how can they feel that the sinner is a rebel against 
God, and that he deserves to be sent to hell ? How can they 
feel that the sinner is to blame ? And how can they take God's 
part when they pray ? If they do not take God's part against 
the sinner, they cannot expect God will regard their prayers, 
for they do not pray with right motives. No doubt one great 
reason why so many prayers are not answered, is that those 
who pray do in fact take the sinner's part against God. They 
pray as if the sinner was a poor unfortunate being, to be pit- 
ied, rather than as if he was a guilty wretch, to be blamed. 
And the reason is that they do not believe sinners are able to 
obey God. If a person does not believe that sinners are able 
to obey their Maker, and really believes that the Spirit's influ- 



THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 301 

ences are necessary to make him able, it is impossible, with 
these views, to offer acceptable and prevailing prayer for the 
sinner, and it is not wonderful that persons with these views 
should not prevail with God, and should doubt about the 
efficacy of the prayer of faith. 

How often do you hear people pray for sinners in this style, 
" O Lord, help this poor soul to do what he is required to do — 
O Lord, enable him to do so and so." Now this language 
implies that they take the sinner's part, and not God's. If it 
was understood by those who use it, as it is sometimes ex- 
plained, and if people meant by it what they ought to mean 
when they plead for sinners, I would not find so much fault 
with it. But the truth is, that when people use this language, 
they often mean just what the language itself would be natu- 
rally at first sight, understood to mean, which is just as if 
they should pray, " Lord, thou commandest these poor sin- 
ners to repent, when, O Lord, thou knowest they cannot re- 
pent unless thou givest them thy Spirit, to enable them to do 
it, though thou hast declared that thou wilt send them to hell 
if they do not, whether they ever receive the Spirit or not ; 
and now, Lord, this seems very hard, and we pray thee to 
have pity upon these poor creatures, and do not deal so hard- 
ly with them, for Christ's sake." Who does not see that 
such a prayer, or a prayer which means this, whatever lan- 
guage it may be couched in, is an insult to God, charging him 
with infinite injustice, if he continues to exact from sinners 
a duty which they are unable to perform without that aid 
which he will not grant. People may pray in this way till 
the day of judgment, and never obtain a blessing, because 
they take the sinners part against God. They cannot pray 
successfully, until they understand that the sinner is a rebel, 
and obstinate in his rebellion — so obstinate that he never will, 
without the Holy Spirit, do what he might do as well as not, 
instantly, and this obstinacy is the reason, and the only rea- 
son, why he needs the influence of the Holy Spirit for his 
conversion. The only ground on which the sinner needs 
divine agency is to overcome his obstinacy, and make him 
willing to do what he can do, and what God justly requires 
him to do. And a church are never in an attitude in which 
God will hear their united prayers, unless they are agreed in 
so understanding their dependence on God, as to feel it in 
perfect consistency with the sinner's blame, if it is the other 
way, they are agreed in understanding it wrong, and their 
prayers for divine help to the unfortunate instead of divine 
favor to make a rebel submit, are wide of the mark, are an 
insult to God, and they never will obtain favor in heaven. 



302 THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

(3.) They must be agreed in understanding that revivals are 
not miracles, but that they are brought about by the use of means 
like other events. No wonder revivals formerly came so sel- 
dom and continued so short a time, when people generally re- 
garded them as miracles, or like a mere shower of rain, that 
will come on a place and continue a little while, and then blow 
over ; that is, as something over which we have no control. 
For what can people do to get a shower of rain ? Or how 
can they make it rain any longer than it does rain? It is ne- 
cessary that those who pray should be agreed in understand- 
ing a revival as something to be brought about by means, 
or they never will be agreed in using them. 

(4) They must be agreed in understanding that human 
agency is just as indispensable to a revival as divine agency. 
Such a thing as a revival of religion, I venture to say, never 
did occur without divine agency, and never did occur without 
human agency. How often do people say, " God can, if he 
pleases, carry on the work ivithout means." But I have no 
faith in it, for there is no evidence of it. What is religion ? 
Obedience to God's law. But the law cannot be obeyed un- 
less it is known. And how can God make sinners obey but 
by making known his commandments? And how can he 
make them known but by revealing them himself, or sending 
them by others— that is, by bringing THE TEXJTH to bear 
upon the person's mind till he obeys it. God never did and 
never can convert a sinner except with the truth. "What is 
conversion ? Obeying the truth. He may communicate it 
himself, directly to the sinner. But then, the sinner's own 
agency is indispensable, for conversion consists in the right 
employment of the sinner's own agency. And ordinarily, 
he employs the. agency of others also, in printing, writing, 
conversation, and preaching. God has put the Gospel treas- 
ure in earthen vessels. He has seen fit to employ men in 
preaching the word. That is, he has seen that human agency 
is that which he can best employ in saving sinners. And if 
there ever was a case, of which we have no evidence, there is 
not one in a thousand, if one in a million, converted in any 
other way than through the truth, made known and urged 
by human instrumentality. And as the church must be 
united in using those means, it is plainly necessary that they 
should be united in understanding the true reason why 
means are to be used, and the true principles on which they 
are to be governed and applied. 

5. It is important that there should be union in regard to 
the measures essential to the promotion of a revival. Let inch- 



THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 303 

viduals agree to do anything whatever, and if they are not 
agreed in their measures, they will run into confusion, and 
counteract one another. Set them to sail a ship, and they 
never can get along without agreement. If they attempt to 
do business as merchants when they are not agreed in their 
measures, what will they do ? Why, they will only undo each 
other's work, and thwart the whole business of the concern. 
All this is pre-eminently true in regard to the work of pro- 
moting a revival. Otherwise the members of the church will 
counteract each other's influence, and they need not expect a 
revival. 

(1.) The church must be agreed in regard to the meetings 
which are held, as to what meetings shall be held, and how 
many, and where, and when they shall be held. Some people 
always desire to multiply meetings in a revival, as if the 
more meetings they had, the more religion. Others are 
always opposed to any new meetings in a revival. Some are 
always for having a protracted meeting, and others are never 
ready to hold a protracted meeting at all. Whatever differ- 
ence there may be, it is essential that the church should come 
to a good understanding on the subject, so that they can go 
on together in harmony, and labor with zeal and effect. 

(2.) They must be agreed as to the manner of conducting 
meetings. It is necessary that the church should be united 
and cordial on this subject, if they expect to offer united 
prayer with effect. Sometimes there are individuals who 
want to adopt every new thing they can hear of or imagine, 
while others are totally uQwillmg to have anything altered in 
regard to the management of the meeting, but would have 
eveiything done precisely as they are accustomed to. They 
ought to be agreed in some way, either to have the meetings 
altered, or to keep them on in the old way. The best pos- 
sible way is, for the church to agree in this, that they will 
let the meetings go on and take their course, just as the Spirit * 
of God shapes them, and not even attempt to make two 
meetings just alike. The church never will give the fullest 
effect to the truth until they are agreed in this principle — 
that in promoting a revival they will accommodate their 
measures to circumstances, and not attempt to interrupt the 
natural course which pious feeling and sound judgment in- 
dicate, but cast themselves entirely upon the guidance and 
direction of the Holy Spirit, introducing any measure, at any 
time, that shall seem called for in the Providence of God, 
without laying any stress upon its being new or old. 

6. They must be agreed in the manner of dealing with im- 



304 THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

penitent sinners. This is a point immensely important, that 
the church should be agreed in their treatment of sinners. 
Suppose that they are not agreed, and one will tell a sinner 
one thing and another another. "What confusion ! How can 
they agree in prayer, when it is plain that they are not agreed 
as to the things they shall pray for. Go among such a 
church, and hear them pray for sinners. Attend a prayer 
meeting and listen. Here is one man prays that the sinners 
present may repent. Another prays that they may be con- 
victed, and perhaps, if he is very much engaged, will go so 
far as to pray that they may be deeply convicted. Another 
prays that sinners may go home solemn, and pensive, and 
silent, meditating upon the truths they have heard. Another 
prays in such a manner, that you can see he is afraid to have 
them converted now. Another prays very solemnly that they 
may not attempt to do anything in their own strength. And 
so on. How easy it is to see that the church are not agreed 
as touching the things they ask for, and of course they have 
no interest in the promise. 

If you set them to talk with sinners, their courses would 
be just as discordant, for it is plain that they are not agreed, 
and have no clear views in regard to what a sinner must 
do to be saved, or of what ought to be said to sinners, to 
bring them to repent. And the consequence is, that sinners 
who are awakened and anxious, presently get confounded, 
and do not know what to do, and perhaps give it all up in 
despair, or conclude there is in reality nothing rational or 
consistent in religion. One will tell the sinner he must repent, 
immediately. Another will give him a book, Doddridge's Rise 
and Progress perhaps, and tell him to read that book. An- 
other will tell him he must pray and persevere, and in God's 
time he will obtain the blessing. A revival can never go on 
for any length of time amidst such difficulties. If it begins, 
it must soon run out ; unless, perhaps, the body of the 
church will keep still and say nothing at all, and let others 
carry on the work. And there the work will suffer materially 
for want of their co-operation and support. A church ought 
to be agreed. Every Christian ought to have a clear under- 
standing of this subject, and all speak the same thing, and 
give the same directions. And then the sinner will find no 
one to take his part, and can get no relief or comfort till he 
repents. 

7. They must be agreed in removing the impediments to a 
revival. If a church expect a revival, they must take up 
the stumbling blocks out of the way. 



THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 305 

(1.) In the exercise of discipline. If there are rotten mem- 
bers in the church, they should be removed, and the church 
should all agree to cut them off. If they remain in the 
church, they are such a reproach to religion, as to hinder a 
revival. Sometimes when an attempt is made to cast them 
out, this creates division, and thus the work is stopped. 
Sometimes the offenders are persons of influence, or they 
have family friends who will take their part, and make a 
party, and thus create a bad spirit, and prevent a revival. 

(2.) In mutual confessions. Whenever wrong has been 
done to any, there should be a full confession. I do not 
mean a cold and forced acknowledgment, such as saying, " If 
I have done wrong, I am sorry for it." But a hearty con- 
fession, going the full length of the wrong, and showing that 
it comes out of a broken heart. 

(3. ) Forgiveness of enemies. A great obstruction to revivals 
is often found in the fact that active and leading individuals 
harbor a revengeful and unforgiving spirit towards those who 
have injured them, which destroys their spirituality, makes 
them harsh and disagreeable in their manner, and prevents 
them from enjoying either communion with God in prayer, 
or the blessing of God to give them success in labor. But 
let the members of a church be truly agreed in breaking 
down and confessing their own faults, and in cherishing a 
tender, merciful, forgiving, Christ-like spirit toward those who 
they think have done them wrong, and then the Spirit will 
come down upon them not by measure. 

8. They must be agreed in making all the necessary prepara- 
tions for a revival. They should be agreed in having all 
necessary preparation made, and agreed in bearing then part 
of the labor or expense of making it. There should be an 
equality, and not let a few be burdened and the rest do little 
or nothing, but every one his prorjortion, according to his 
several ability. Then there will be no envying nor jealousy, 
nor any of those mutual recriminations and altercations and 
disrespectful remarks about one another, which are so incon- 
sistent with brotherly love, and such a stumbling block in 
the way of sinners. 

9. They must be agreed in doing heartily whatever is neces- 
sary to be done for the ^promotion of the revival. Sometimes a 
slight disagreement about a very little thing will be allowed 
to break in and destroy a revival. A minister told me that 
he once went to labor in a place as an evangelist, and the 
Spirit of God was evidently present, and sinners began to 
inquire, and things looked quite favorable, until some of the 



<°>0G THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

members in the chirrck began to agitate the inquiry how they 
should pay him for his services. They said, "If he stays among 
us any longer, he will expect we should give him something." 
and they did not see how they could afford to do it. Aid 
they talked about it until the minds of the brethren got dis- 
tracted and divided, and the minister went away. Look at 
it. There God stood in the door of that church, with his 
hands full of mercies but these parsimonious and wicked pro- 
fessors thought it would cost something to have a revival, 
and their expenses were about as much as they felt willing 
or able to bear. And so they let him depart and the work 
ceased. The minister would not have left at the time, wheth- 
er they gave him anything or not, for what he should re- 
ceive, or whether he should receive anything from them, was 
a question about which he felt no concern. But the church 
by their parsimonious spirit got into such a state as to grieve 
the Spirit, and he saw that to stay longer with them would 
do no good. Oh, how will those professors feel when they 
meet sinners from that town in judgment, when it will all 
come out, that God was ready and waiting to grant them 
a blessing, but they allowed themselves to get agitated and 
divided by inquiring how much they should have to pay ! 

10. They must be agreed in laboring to cany on the work. 
It is not enough that they should agree to pray for a revival, 
but they should agree also in laboring to promote it. They 
should set themselves to it systematically, and as a matter 
of business, to visit and converse and pray with their neigh- 
bors ; to look out for opportunities of doing good ; to watch 
the effect of the word, and watch the signs of the times, that 
they may know when anything needs to be done, and do it. 

(1.) They should be agreed to labor. 
(2.) They should be agreed how to labor. 
(3.) They should be agreed to live accordingly. 

11. They must agree in a determination to persevere. It 
will not answer for some members of the church to-day to be- 
gin to move and bluster about, and then, as soon as the least 
thing turns up unfavorable, to get discouraged, and faint, and 
one-half of them give over. They should be all united and 
agree to persevere, and labor, and pray, and hold on, until 
the blessing comes. 

In a word, if Christians expect to unite in prayer and 
effort, so as to prevail with God, they must be agreed in 
speaking and doing the same things, in walking by the same 
rule, and maintaining the same principles, and in persevering 
till they obtain the blessing, so as not to hinder or thwart 



THE NECESSITY AXD EFFECT OF TTNTON. 307 

each other's efforts. All this is evidently implied in being 
agreed as touching the things for which they are praying. 

REMAKKS. 

1. We see why it is that so many of the children of profess- 
ing parents are not converted. 

It is because the parents have not been agreed as touching 
the things they should pray for in behalf of their children. 
Perhaps they never had any kind of agreement respecting 
them. Perhaps they were never agreed even as to what was 
the very best thing they could ask for them. Sometimes 
parents are not agreed in anything, but their opinions clash, 
and they are perpetually disagreeing, and their children see 
it, and then no wonder they are not converted. 

Or perhaps they may not be agreed as touching the salva- 
tion of their children. Are they sincere in desiring it ? Do 
they agree to desire, and agree from right motives ? Do 
they agree in regard to the importance of it? Are they 
agreed how their children ought to be dealt with, to effect 
their conversion — -what shall be said to them — how it shall 
be said — when — by whom. Alas ! in how many cases is it 
evident they are not agreed. Probably few cases will be 
found, where children remain unconverted, but what it will 
prove that the parents were never truly agreed as touching 
the things they should ask for the salvation of their children. 

Often there is such disagreement that we could not expect 
any good to result, or anything but ruin to the children. 
The husband and wife often disagree entirely and funda- 
mentally in regard to the manner of bringing up their chil- 
dren. Perhaps the wife is fond of dress, and display, and 
visiting, while the husband is plain and humble, and is 
grieved and distressed, and mourns and prays to see how his 
children are puffed up with vanity. Or it may be that the 
father is ambitious, and wants to have his daughters fashion- 
ably educated and make a display, and his sons become great 
men, and so he will send his daughters to a polite boarding- 
school, where they may learn anything but their duty to 
God, and will be all the time pushing his sons forward, and 
goading their ambition, while the mother grieves and weeps 
in secret to see her dear children hurried on to destruction, 
and all her own influence counteracted, and her sons and 
daughters trained up to serve the god of this world, and go 
to hell. 

2. We see the hypocrisy of those who profess to be pray- 



308 THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

ing for a revival while they are doing nothing to promote it. 
There are many who appear to be very zealous in praying 
for a revival, w T hile they are not doing anything at all for one. 
What do they mean ? Are they agreed as touching the things 
they ask for ? Certainly not. They cannot be agreed in of- 
fering acceptable prayer for a revival until they are prepared 
TO DO what God requires them to do to promote it. What 
would you think of the farmer who should' pray for a crop, 
and not plough nor sow ? Would you think such prayers 
pious, or an insult to God ? 

3. We see why so many prayers offered in the church are 
never answered. It is because those who offered them never 
were agreed as touching the things they asked for. Perhaps 
the minister never laid the subject before them, never ex- 
plained what it is to be agreed, nor showed them its impor- 
tance, nor set before them the great encouragement which 
the promise before us affords to churches that will agree. 
Perhaps the members of the church have never conferred to- 
gether, and compared their views, to see whether they under- 
stood the subject alike, whether they were agreed in regard to 
the motives, grounds, and importance of being united in 
prayer and labor for a revival. Suppose you were to go 
through the churches in this city, and learn the precise views 
and feelings of the members on this subject. How many 
would you find who were agreed even in regard to the essen- 
tial and indispensable things, concerning which it is neces- 
sary Christians should be agreed in order to unite in prevail- 
ing prayer ? Perhaps no two could be found who are agreed; 
and if two were found whose views and desires were alike, 
it would probably be ascertained that they are unacquainted 
with each other, and of course neither act nor pray together. 

4. We see why it is that this text has been generally un- 
derstood to mean something different from what it says. 
People have first read it wrong. They have read it as if it 
was, " If any two of you shall agree to ash anything, it shall 
be done." And as they have often agreed to ask for things, 
and the things were not done, they have said, " The literal 
meaning of the text cannot be true, for we have tried it and 
know it is not true. How many prayer meetings have we 
held, and how many petitions have we put up, in which we 
have perfectly agreed in asking for blessings, and yet they 
have not been granted ?" Now the fact is, that they have 
never yet understood what it is to be agreed as touching the 
things they are to ask for. I am sure this is no strained 
construction of the text, but is its true and obvious meaning, 



THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 309 

as a plain, pious reader would understand it, if he inquired 
seriously and earnestly the true import. They must be 
agreed not only in asking, but in everything else that is in- 
dispensable to the existence of the thing prayed for. Sup- 
pose two of you were agreed in desiring to go to London to- 
gether. If you are not agreed in regard to the means, what 
route you shall take, and what ship you will go in, you will 
never get there together. Just so in praying for a revival, 
you must be agreed in regard to the means and circum- 
stances, and everj^thing essential to the existence and progress 
of a revival. 

5. "We may ordinarily expect a revival of religion to pre- 
vail and extend among those without the church, just in 
proportion to the union of prayer and effort within. If 
there is a general union within the church, the revival will 
be general. If the union continues, the revival will con- 
tinue. If anything begins to break in upon this perfect 
union in prayer and effort, it will begin to hmit the revival. 
How great and powerful would be the revival in this city, 
if all the churches in the city were thus united in pro- 
moting it ! 

There is another fact which I have witnessed, worthy of 
notice. I have observed, that a revival will prevail out of 
the church, among persons in that class of society, amongst 
whom it prevails in the church. If the females in the church 
are most awake and prayerful, the work may ordinarily be 
expected to prevail mostly among females out of the church, 
and more women will be converted than men. If the youth 
of either, or of both sexes, in the church are most awake, the 
work is most likely to prevail among youth, male or female, 
or both, as the work may be in the church, in this respect. 
If the heads of families and the principal men in the church 
are awake, the revival is, I have observed, more likely to pre- 
vail among that class out of the church. I have known a re- 
vival mostly confined to females, and few males converted, 
apparently because the male part of the church did not take 
hold and work. Again I have repeatedly known the greatest 
number of converts among men, owing apparently to the fact 
that the male part of the church were most engaged. When 
the revival does not reach a particular class of the impeni- 
tent, pains should be taken to arouse that portion of the 
church who are of their own age and standing, to make 
more direct efforts for their conversion. There seems to be 
a philosophy in this fact, which has often been witnessed. 
Different classes of professors naturally feel a sympathy for 



310 THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

the impenitent of their own sex and age and rank, and more 
naturally pray for them, and have more intercourse with 
them, and more influence over them, and this seems to be at 
least one of the .reasons why revivals are apt to be the most 
powerful and general in that class without the church, who 
are the most awake in the church. Christians should under- 
stand this, and feel their responsibility. One great reason 
why so few of the principal men are sometimes converted in 
revivals, doubtless is, that that class in the church are often 
so worldly, they cannot be aroused* The revival will gen- 
erally prevail mostly in those families where the professors 
belonging to them are awake, and the impenitent belonging 
to those families where the professors are not awake, are apt 
to be left unconverted. One principal reason, obviously is, 
that when the professors in a family or neighborhood are 
awake, there is not only prayer offered for sinners in the 
midst of them, but there are corresponding influences acting 
upon the impenitent among them. If they are awake, their 
looks and lives and warnings, all tend to promote the con- 
version of their impenitent friends. But if they are asleep, 
all their influences tend to prevent their conversion. Their 
coldness grieves the Spirit, their worldliness contradicts 
the Gospel, and all their intercourse with their impenitent 
friends is in favor of impenitence, and calculated to perpetu- 
ate it. 

6. We see why different denominations have been suffered 
to spring up in the church, and under the government of 
God. 

Christians often see and deplore the evils that have arisen 
to the church of God, from the division of his people into 
jarring sects. And they have wondered and been perplex- 
ed, to think that God should suffer it to be so. But in the 
light of this subject we can see, that considering what diver- 
sities of opinions and feelings and views actually exist in the 
church, much good results from this division of sects. Con- 
sidering this diversity of opinion, many would never agree to 
pray and labor together, so as to do it with success, and so it 
is better they should separate, and let those unite who are 
agreed. In all cases where there cannot be a cordial agree- 
ment in labor, it is better that each denomination should labor 
by themselves, so long as this difference exists. I have some- 
times seen revivals broken up by attempting to unite Chris- 
tians of different denominations in prayer and labor together, 
while they were not agreed as to the principles or measures 
by which the w T ork was to be promoted. They would then 



THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 311 

undo each other's work, and destroy each other's influence, 
perplex the anxious, and give occasion to enemies to blas- 
pheme, and soon their feelings would get soured, and the 
Spirit of God is grieved away, and the work stops, and per- 
haps painful confusion and controversy follow. 

7. We see why God sometimes suffers churches to be di- 
vided. It is because he finds that the members are so much 
at variance that they will not pray and labor together with 
effect. Sometimes churches that are in such a state, will still 
keep together from worldly considerations and worldly policy, 
because it is so much easier, for the whole to support public 
worship. Perhaps both parties want to keep the meeting- 
house, or both want to retain the minister, and they cannot 
agree which shall go off, and so they continue along, jealous 
and jangling for years, accomphshing little or nothing for the 
salvation of sinners. In such cases, God has often let some- 
thing turn up among them, that would tear them asunder, 
and then each party would go to work in their own way, and 
perhaps both would prosper. While they were in the same 
church, they were always making each other trouble, as they 
did not think nor feel alike, but as soon as they were sepa- 
rated, every thing settled down in peace, and made it evident 
that it was better they should divide. I have known some 
cases in this State, where this has been done with the happi- 
est results, and both churches have been speedily blessed with 
revivals. 

8. It is evident that many more churches need to be divided. 
How many churches there are, that are holding together, and 
yet are doing no good, for the simple reason that they are 
not sufficiently agreed. They do . not think alike nor feel 
alike on the subjects connected with revivals, and while this is 
so, they never can work together. Unless they can be 
brought to such a change of views and feelings on the sub- 
ject as will unite them, they are only a hindrance to each 
other and to the work of God. In many cases they see and 
feel that it is so, and yet they keep together, conscientiously, 
for fear a division should dishonor religion, when in fact the 
division that now exists may be making religion a by-word 
and a reproach. Far better would it be if they would just 
agree to divide amicably, like Abraham and Lot. " If thou 
wilt take the left hand, I will go to the right ; or if thou de- 
part to the right hand, then I will go to the left." Let them 
separate, and each work in his own way, and they may both 
enjoy the blessing. 

9. We see why a few individuals, who are perfectly united 



312 THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

may be successful in gathering and building up a new church, 
and may do so much better than a much larger number who 
are not agreed among themselves. If I were going to gather 
a new church in this city, I should rather have five persons, 
or three, or even two that were perfectly agreed as touching 
the things they were, to pray for, and the manner in which 
they should labor for them, and in all that is essential to the 
prosperity of a church, and who would stand by me, and 
stand by each other, than to have a church to begin with, of 
five hundred members who were not agreed. 

10. We see what glorious things may be expected for Zion, 
whenever the churches generally shall be agreed on these sub- 
jects. When ministers shall lay aside their prejudices, and 
their misconstructions, and their jealousies, and shall see eye 
to eye, and when the churches shall understand the Bible 
alike, and see their duty alike, and pray alike, and shall be 
" agreed as touching the things they shall ask for," a nation 
shall be born in a day. Only let them feel as the heart of one 
man, and be agreed as to w r hat ought to be done for the sal- 
vation of the world, and the millennium will come at once. 

11. There is vast ignorance in the churches on the subject 
of revivals. After all the revivals that have been enjoyed, 
and all that has been said and written and printed concern- 
ing revivals, there are very few who have any real, consistent 
Jcnoivledge on the subject. And when there is a revival, how 
few are there who can take hold to labor and promote it as if 
they understood what they were about. How few persons 
are to be found, who have ever taken up revivals of religion 
as a subject to be studied and understood. Every body 
knows, that in a revival Christians must pray, and must do 
some things which they have not been in the habit of doing. 
But multitudes know nothing of the KEASON WHY they 
should do this, or why one tiling is better than another, and 
of course they have no principles to guide them, and when 
anything occurs which they did not expect, they are all at 
fault and know nothing what to do. If men should go to 
work to build a house of worship, and know as little how to 
proceed as many ministers and professors know how to build 
the spiritual temple of God, they never would get up a house 
in the world. And yet people make themselves believe they 
are building the church of God, when they know nothing at 
all what they are about, and are utterly unable to give a rea- 
son why they are doing as they do, or why one thing should 
be done rather than another. There are multitudes in the 
church who never seem to suppose that the work of promo- 



THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 313 

ting revivals of religion is one that requires study, and 
thought, and knowledge of principles, and skill in applying 
the word of God, so as to give every one his portion in sea- 
son. And so they go on, generally doing little or nothing be- 
cause they are attempting nothing, and if they ever do 
awake, go headlong to work, without any system or plan, as 
if God had left this part of our duty out of the reach of 
sound judgment and good sense. 

12. There is vast ignorance among ministers upon this sub- 
ject, and one great reason of this ignorance is, that many get 
the idea that they already understand all about revivals, when 
in reality they know next to nothing about them. I once 
knew a minister come in where there was a powerful revival, 
and bluster about and find fault with many things, speaking 
of his knowledge of revivals, that he had been in seventeen 
of them and so on, when it was evident that he knew nothing 
as he ought to know of revivals. 

13. How important it is that the church should be trained 
and instructed, so as to know what to do in a revival. They 
should be trained and disciplined like an army ; each one 
having a place to fill, and something to do, and knowing 
where he belongs, and what he has to do, and how to do it. 
Instead of this, how often do you see a church in a time of 
revival take hold of the work to promote it, just like a parcel 
of children taking hold to build a house. How few are there 
that really know how to do — what? — Why, the very thing for 
which God suffers Christians to live in this world, the very 
thing for which ALONE he would ever let them remain away 
from heaven a day, is the very thing of all others that they 
do not study and do not try to understand. 

14. We see why revivals are often so short, and why they 
so often produce a reaction. It is because the church do not 
understand the subject. Eevivals are short, because pro- 
fessors have been stirred up to a spasmodical kind of action. 
They have gone to work by impulse rather than from deliber- 
ate conviction of duty, and have been guided by their feel- 
ings rather than by a sound understanding of what they 
ought to do. The church did not know what to do, what 
they could do, and what they could not, nor how to husband 
their strength, nor what the state of things would bear, and 
perhaps their zeal led them into some indiscretions, and they 
lost their hold on God, and so the enemy prevailed. The 
church ought to be so trained as to know what to do, so as 
never to fail, and never to suffer defeat or reaction, when 
they attempt to promote a revival. They should understand 

14 



314 THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

all the tactics of the devil, and know where to guard against 
his devices, so that they may know him when they see him, 
and not mistake him for an angel of light come to give them 
lessons of wisdom in promoting the revival, and so they can 
co-operate wisely with the minister, and with one another, and 
with the Holy Ghost, in carrying on the work. No person 
who has been conversant in revivals can overlook the fact, 
that the ignorance of professors of religion concerning revi- 
vals, and their stupid blunders are among the most common 
things that put revivals down, and bring back a fearful re- 
action upon the church. Brethren, How long shall this be 
so ? It ought not to be so, it need not be so, shall it always 
be so? 

15. "We see that every church is justly responsible for the 
souls that are among them. If God has given such a promise, 
and if it is true that where so many as two are agreed, as 
touching the things they ask for, it shall be done, then cer- 
tainly Christians are responsible, and if sinners are lost, their 
blood will be found upon the church. If the churches can 
have what they ask, as soon as they are agreed as touching it, 
then certainly the damnation of the world will be required 
at the hands of the church. 

16. We see the guilt of ministers, in not informing them- 
selves, and rightly and speedily instructing the churches upon 
this momentous subject. W T hy, what is the end of the Chris- 
tian ministry ? What have they to do, but to instruct and 
marshal the sacramental host, and lead them on to conquest. 
What ! let the church remain in ignorance upon the very 
subject, and the only point of duty, for the performance of 
which they are in the world, the salvation of sinners. Some 
ministers have acted as mysteriously about revivals, as if they 
thought Christians were either incapable of understanding 
how to promote them, or that it was of no importance that 
they should know. But this is all wrong. No minister has 
yet begun to understand, or do his duty, if he has neglected 
to teach his church to work for God in the promotion of re- 
vivals. What is he about ? What does he mean ? Wiry is 
he a minister ? To what end has he taken the sacred office ? 
Is it that he " may eat a piece of bread ? " 

17. We see that pious parents can render the salvation of 
their children certain. Only let them pray in faith, and be 
agreed as touching the things they shall ask for, and God 
has promised them the desire of their hearts. Who can be 
agreed so well as parents ? Let them be agreed in }Drayer, 
and agreed what to do, and agreed in doing all their duty ; 



THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 315 

let them thus train up their children in the way they should 
go, and when they are old, they will not depart from it. 

And now, brethren, do you believe you are agreed, accord- 
ing to the meaning of this promise ? I know that where a 
few individuals may be agreed in some things, they may pro- 
duce some effect. But while the body of the church are not 
agreed, there will always be so many things to counteract, 
that they will accomplish but little. THE CHUKCH MUST 
BE AGREED. Oh^ if we could find one church that were 
perfectly and heartily agreed in all these points, so that they 
could pray and labor together, all as one, what good would 
be done ! But now, while things are as they are, we see 
colony after colony peopling hell, because the church are 
not agreed Oh, what do Christians think, how can they 
keep still, when God has brought down his blessings so that 
if any two were agreed, as touching the things they ask for, 
it would be don^e. Alas ! alas ! how bitter will be the re- 
membrance of these j anglings in the church, when Chris- 
tians come to see the crowds of lost souls that have gone 
down to hell, because ice were not agreed to labor and pray 
for their salvation. 

Finally. — In the light of this promise we see the awful 
guilt of the church. G6d has given it to be the precious in- 
heritance of his people at all times, and in all places. If his 
people agree, their prayers will be answered. We see the 
awful guilt of this church, who come here and listen to lectures 
about revivals and then go away and have no revival, and 
also the guilt of members of other churches who hear these 
lectures and go home and refuse to do their duty. How can 
you meet the thousands of impenitent sinners around you, 
at the bar of God, and see them sink away into everlast- 
ing burnings ? Have you been united in heart to pray for 
them ? If you have not, why have you disagreed ? Why 
have you not prayed with this promise until you have pre- 
vailed ? 

You will now either be agreed, and pray for the Holy 
Ghost, and receive him before you leave the house, or the 
anger of the Lord will be upon you. Should you now agree 
to pray in the sense of this promise, for the Spirit of God to 
come down on this city, the heavenly dove would fly through 
the city in the midst of the night and would rouse the con- 
sciences and break up the guilty slumbers of the wicked. 
What then is the crimson guilt of those professors of religion 
who are sleeping in sight of such a promise ? They seem to 
have skipped over, or to have entirely forgotten it. Multi- 



316 THE NECESSITY AND EFFECT OF UNION. 

tudes of sinners going to hell in all directions, and yet this 
blessed promise is neglected ; yea, more, is practwaUy despised 
by the church. There it stands in the solemn record, and the 
church might take hold of it in such a manner that vast num- 
bers might be saved, but they are not agreed. Therefore 
souls will perish. And where is the responsibility? Who 
can take this promise and look the perishing in the face at the 
day of judgment ? 

These lectures were greatly instrumental in reviving re- 
ligion in the church to which they were preached, and their 
publication in this country and in Europe has been the means 
of promoting revivals in very many places. To God belongs 
all the glory. 









LECTURE XVH. 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 



Text.— How then comfort ye me in Tain, seeing in your answers there remaineth 
falsehood.— Job xxi. 34. 

Job's three friends insisted on it that the afflictions which 
he suffered were sent as a punishment for his sins, and were 
evidence conclusive that he was a hypocrite, and not a good 
man as he professed to be. A lengthy argument ensued, in 
which Job referred to all past experience, to prove that men 
are not dealt with in this world according to their character ; 
that the distinction is not observed in the allotments of 
Providence. His friends maintained the opposite, and inti- 
mated that this world is also a place of rewards and punish- 
ments, in which men receive good or evil, according to their 
deeds. In this chapter, Job shows by appealing to common 
* sense and common observation, and experience, that this can- 
not be true, because it is a matter of fact that the wicked are 
often prosperous in the world and through life, and hence 
infers that their judgment and punishment must be reserved 
for a future state. " The wicked is reserved to the day of de- 
struction," and " they shall be brought forth to the day of 
his wrath." And inasmuch as his friends came to comfort 
him, but being in the dark on this fundamental point, had 
not been able to understand his case, and so could not afford 
him any comfort, but rather aggravated his grief, Job in- 
sisted upon it that he would still look to a future state for 
consolation, and rebukes them by exclaiming, in the bitter- 
ness of his soul, "How then comfort ye me in vain, seeing in 
your answers there remaineth falsehood ?" 

My present purpose is, to make some remarks upon the 
various methods employed in comforting anxious sinners, and 
I design : 

L To notice briefly the necessity and design of instructing 
anxious sinners. 

II. To show that anxious sinners are always seeking 
comfort. Their supreme object is to get comfort in their 
distress. 

(317) 



318 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

III. To notice some of the false comforts often adminis- 
tered. 

I. The necessity and design of instructing anxious sinners. 

The very idea of anxiety implies some instruction. A sin- 
ner would not be anxious at aU about his future state, unless 
he had light enough to know that he is a sinner, and that he 
is in danger of punishment and needs forgiveness. But men 
are to be converted, not by physical force, or by a change 
wrought in their nature or constitution by creative power, 
but by the truth made effectual by the Holy Spirit. Conver- 
sion is yielding to the truth. And therefore, the more truth 
can be brought to bear upon the mind, other things being 
equal,, so much the more probable is it that the individual 
will be converted. Unless the truth is brought to bear upon 
him, it is certain he ivill not be converted. If it is brought to 
bear, it is not absolutely certain that it will be effectual, but 
the probability is in proportion ip the extent to which the 
truth is brought to bear. The great design of dealing with 
an anxious sinner is to clear up all his difficulties and dark- 
ness, and to do away all his errors, and sap the foundation 
of his self-righteous hopes, and sweep away every vestige of 
comfort that he could find in himself. There is often much 
difficulty in this, and much instruction is required. Sinners 
often cling with a death grasp to their false dependences. * 
The last place to which a sinner ever betakes himself for re- * 
lief is to Jesus Christ. Sinners had rather be saved in any 
other way in the world. They had rather make any sacrifice, 
go to any expense, or endure any suffering, than just to 
throw themselves as guilty and lost rebels upon Christ alone 
for salvation. This is the very last way in which they are 
ever willing to be saved. It cuts up all their self-righteous- 
ness, and annihilates their pride and self-satisfaction so com- 
pletely, that they are exceedingly unwilling to adopt it. But 
it is as true in philosophy as it is in fact, that this is, after all, 
the only way in which a sinner could find relief. If God 
should attempt to relieve sinners, and save them without 
humbling their pride and turning them from their sins, he 
could not do it. Now the object of instructing an anxious 
sinner should be to lead him by the shortest possible way to 
do this. It is to bring his mind, by the shortest route, to the 
practical conclusion that there is, in fact, no other way in 
which he can be relieved and saved, but to renounce himself 
and rest in Christ alone. To do this with effect requires 
great skill. It requires a thorough knowledge of the human 
heart, a clear understanding of the plan of salvation, and a 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 319 

precise and definite idea of the very thing that a sinner 
MUST DO in order to be saved. To know how to do this 
effectually is one of the rarest qualifications in the ministry 
at the present day. It is distressing to see how few minis- 
ters, and how few professors of religion there are who have 
in their own minds that distinct idea of tJie thing to be done, 
that they can go to an anxious sinner and tell him exactly 
what he has to do, and how to do it, and can show him clearly 
that there is no possible way for him to be saved but by doing 
that very thing which they can tell him, and make him feel 
the certainty that he must do it, and that unless he does that 
very thing, he will be damned. 

TL I am to show that anxious sinners are always seeking 
comfort. 

Sinners often imagine they are seeking Jesus Christ, and seek- \J 
ing religion, but this is a mistake. No person ever sought re- 
ligion, and yet remained irreligious. What is religion ? It 
is obeying God. Seeking religion is seeking to obey God. 
The soul that hungers and thirsts after righteousness is the 
soul of a Christian. To say that a person can seek to obey 
God, and yet not obey him, is absurd. For if he is seeking 
religion he is not an impenitent sinner. To seek religion, im- 
plies a willingness to obey God, and a willingness to obey 
God is religion. It is a contradiction to say that an impeni- 
tent sinner is seeking religion. It is the same as to say, that 
he seeks and actually longs to obey God, and God will not let 
him, or that he longs to embrace Jesus Christ, and Christ will 
not let him come. The fact is, the anxious sinner is seeking 
a hope, he is seeking pardon, and comfort, and deliverance 
from hell He is anxiously looking for some one to comfort 
him, and make him feel better, without being obliged to con- 
form to such humiliating conditions as those of the Gospel. 
And his anxiety and distress continue, only because he will 
not yield to the terms. "Unfortunately, anxious sinners find 
comforters enough to their liking. Miserable comforters they 
all are, too, " seeing in their answers there remaineth false- 
hood." No doubt, millions and millions are now in hell, 
because there were those around them who gave them false / 
comfort, who had so much false pity, or were themselves so / 
much in the dark, that they would not let them remain in 
anxiety till they had submitted their hearts to God, but ad- 
ministered falsehood, and relieved their distress in this way, 
and now their souls are lost. 

HL I am to notice several of the ways in which false com- 
fort is given to anxious sinners. 



Sc 



320 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

I might almost say, there is an endless variety of ways in 
which this is done. The more experience I have, and the 
more I observe the ways in which even good people deal with 
anxious sinners, the more I feel grieved at the endless fool- 
eries and falsehoods with which they attempt to comfort their 
anxious friends, and thus, in fact, deceive them and beguile 
them out of their salvation. It often reminds me of the man- 
ner in which people act when any one is sick. Let any one 
of you be sick, with almost any disease in the world, and 
you will find that every person you meet with has a remedy 
for that disorder, a certain cure, a specific, a panacea ; 
and you will find such a w^orld of quackery all around you, 
that if you do not take care and SHUT IT ALL OUT, 
you will certainly lose your life. A man must exercise his 
own judgment, for he will find as many remedies as he 
has friends, and each one is tenacious of his own medi- 
cine, and perhaps will think hard if it is not taken. And 
no doubt this miserable system of quackery kills a great 
many people. 

This is true to no greater extent respecting the diseases of 
the body than respecting the diseases of the mind. People 
have their specifics and their catholicons and their panaceas 
to comfort distressed souls, and whenever they begin to talk 
with an anxious sinner, they will bring in their false comforts, 
so much that if he does not TAKE CARE, and mind the 
word of God, he will infallibly be deceived to his own de- 
struction. I propose to mention a few of the falsehoods 
that are often brought forward in attempting to comfort anx- 
ious sinners. Time woitfd fail me, even to name them all 

The direct object of many persons is to comfort sinners, and 
they are often so intent upon this that they do not stick at 
means or kind of comfort. They see their friends distressed, 
and they pity them, they feel very compassionate, " Oh, oh, I 
cannot bear to see them so distressed, I must comfort them 
somehow," and so they try one way, and another, and all to 
comfort them ! Now, God desires they should be comforted. 
He is benevolent, and has kind feelings, and his heart yearns 
over them, when he sees them so distressed. But he sees that 
there is only one way to give a sinner real comfort. He has 
more benevolence and compassion than all men, and wishes 
to comfort them. But he has fixed the terms as unyielding 
as his throne, on which he will give a sinner relief. And he 
will not alter. He knows that nothing else will do the sinner 
effectual good, for nothing can make him happy, until he re- 
pents of his sins and forsakes them, and turns to God. And 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 321 

therefore God will not yield. Our object should be the same 
as that of God. We should feel compassion and benevolence, 
just as he does, and be as ready to give comfort, but be sure 
that it be of the right kind. The fact is, our prime object 
should be to induce the sinner to obey God. His comfort 
ought to be with us, and with him, but a secondary object, and 
while we are more anxious to relieve his distress than to have 
liim cease to abuse, and dishonor God, we are not likely, by 
our instructions, to do him any real good. This is a funda- 
mental distinction, in dealing with anxious sinners, but it is 
evidently overlooked by many, who seem to have no higher 
motives, than sympathy or compassion for the sinner. If in 
preaching the Gospel, or instructing the anxious, we are not 
actuated by a high regard to the honor of God, and rise no 
higher, than to desire to relieve the distressed ; this is going 
no farther than a constitutional sympathy, or compassion, 
would carry us. Overlooking this principle, has often misled 
professors of religion, and when they have heard others deal- 
ing faithfully with anxious sinners, they have accused them of 
cruelty. I have often had professors bring anxious sinners to 
me, and beg me to comfort them, and, when I have probed 
their consciences to the quick, they have shuddered, and 
sometimes taken the sinners' part- It is sometimes impossi- 
ble to deal effectually with youth who are anxious, in the 
presence of their parents, because they have so much more 
compassion for their children, than regard to the honor of 
God. This is all wrong, and with such views and feelings 
you had better hold your tongue, than to say anything to the 
anxious. 

1. One of the ways in which people give false comfort to 
distressed sinners, is, by asking them " What have you done ? 
you are not so bad." They see them distressed, and cry out, 
"Why, what have you done?" as if they had never done any- 
thing wicked, and had in reality no occasion to feel distressed 
at alL I have before mentioned the case of a fashionable 
lady, who was awakened in this city, and was going to see a 
minister to converse with him, when she was met by a friend, 
who turned her back, and drove off her anxiety, by the cry, 
" What have you done, to make you feel so ? I am snre 
you have never committed any sin, that need to make you 
feel so." * 

I have often met with cases of this kind. A mother will 
tell her son, who is anxious, what an obedient child he has 

* I believe the reporter passed over and did not mention this case. 
14* 



322 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

always been, liow good and how kind, and she begs him not 
to take on so. So a husband will tell his wife, or a wife her 
husband, how good they are, and ask, " What have you done ?" 
When they see them in great distress, they begin to comfort 
them, " Why you are not so bad. You have been to hear 
that frightful minister, that frightens people, and you have 
got excited. Be comforted, for I am sure you have not been 
bad enough to feel so much distressed. " When the truth is, 
they have been a great deal worse than they think they have. 
No sinner ever had an idea that his sins were* greater than 
they are. No sinner ever had an adequate idea of how great 
a sinner he is. It is not probable that any man could live 
under the full sight of his sins. God has, in mercy, spared 
all his creatures on earth that worst of sights, a naked human 
heart. The sinner's guilt is much more deep and damning 
than he thinks, and his danger is much greater than he thinks 
it is, and if he should see them as they are, probably he would 
not live a moment. A sinner may have some false notions on 
the subject, that creates distress, which have no foundation. 
He may think he has committed the unpardonable sin, or that 
he has grieved away the Spirit, or sinned away his day of 
grace. But to tell the most moral and naturally amiable per- 
son in the world that he is good enough, or that he is not so 
bad as he thinks he is, is not giving him rational comfort, but 
is deceiving him, and ruining his soul. Let those who do it, 
take care. 

2. Others tell awakened sinners that " Conversion is a pro- 
gressive work/' and in this way ease their anxiety. When a 
man is distressed, because he sees himself to be such a sinner, 
and that unless he turns to God, he will be damned ; it is a 
great relief to have some friend hold out the idea that he can 
get better by degrees, and that he is now coming on, by little 
and little. They tell him, " Why you cannot expect to get 
along all at once ; I do not believe in these sudden conver- 
sions, you must wait and let it work, you have begun well, 
and by and by you will get comfort. " All this is false as the 
bottomless pit. The truth is, Regeneration, or conversion, is 
not a progressive work. What is regeneration ? What is it 
but the beginning of obedience to God ? And is the beginning 
of a thing progressive ? It is the first act of genuine _ obedi- 
ence to God — -the first voluntary action of the mind that is 
what God approves, or that can be regarded as obedience to 
God. That is conversion. When persons talk about conver- 
sion as a progressive work, it is absurd. They show that 
they know just as much about regeneration or conversion, as 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 323 

Nicodemus did. They know nothing about it, as they ought 
to know, and are no more fit to conduct an anxious meet- 
ing, or to advise or instruct anxious sinners, than Nicode- 
mus was. 

3. Another way in which anxious sinners are deceived with 
false comfort, is by being advised to dismiss the subject for the 
present. 

Men who are supposed to be wise and good, have assumed 
to be so much wiser than God, that when God is dealing with 
a sinner, by his Spirit, and endeavoring to bring him to an 
immediate decision ; they think God is crowding too hard, and 
that it is necessary for them to interfere ; and they will advise 
the person to take a ride, or go into company, or engage in 
business, or something that will relieve his mind a little, at 
least for the present. They might just as well say to God, in 
plain words, " O God, you are too hard, you go too fast, you 
will make him crazy, or kill him, he cannot stand it ; poor crea- 
ture, if he is so pressed, he will die." Just so they take sides 
against God, and do the same as to tell the sinner himself, 
" God will make you crazy if you do not dismiss the subject, 
and resist the Spirit, and drive him away from your mind." 

Such advice, if it be truly conviction of sin that distresses 
the sinner, is in no case, either safe or lawful. The strivings of 
the Spirit, to bring a sinner to himself, will never hurt him, 
nor drive him crazy. He may make himself deranged by re- 
sisting/ but it is blasphemous, to think, that the blessed, wise 
and benevolent Spirit of God, would ever conduct with so 
little care, as to derange and destroy the soul he came to 
sanctify and save. The proper course to take with a sinner, 
when the striving of the Spirit throws him into distress, is, to 
instruct him, to clear up his views, correct his mistakes, and 
make the way of salvation so plain that he can see it right 
before him. Not to dismiss the subject, but fall in with the 
Spirit, and thus hush all those dreadful agonies which are 
produced by resisting the Holy Ghost. BEMEMBEB, if an 
awakened sinner voluntarily dismiss the subject once, proba- 
bly he will never take it up again. 

4. Sometimes an awakened sinner is comforted by being 
told that religion does not consist in feeling bad. I once heard 
of a Doctor of Divinity, giving an anxious sinner such couB' 
sel, when he was actually writhing under the arrows of the 
Almighty. Said he, "Beligion is cheerful, religion is not 
gloomy, do not be distressed, be comforted, dismiss your fears, 
you should not feel so bad," and such like miserable comforts, 
when, in fact, the man had infinite reason to be distressed, 



324 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

for he was resisting the Holy Ghost, and in danger of griev- 
ing him away for ever. 

It is true, religion does not consist in feeling bad. but the 
sinner has reason to be distressed, because he has no religion. 
If he had religion, he would not feel so. Were he a Christian, 
he would rejoice. But to tell an impenitent sinner, to, be 
cheerful ! why, you might as well preach this doctrine in hell, 
and tell them there, "Cheer up here, cheer up, do not feel so 
bad." 

The sinner is on the very verge of hell, he is in rebellion 
against God, and his danger is infinitely greater than he im- 
agines. Oh, what a doctrine of devils ! to tell a rebel against 
heaven not to be distressed. What is all his distress but re- 
bellion itself ? He is not comforted, because he refuses to be 
comforted. God is ready to comfort him. You need not think 
to be more compassionate than God. He will fill him with 
comfort, in an instant, if he will submit. But there he stands, 
struggling against God, and against the Holy Ghost, aud 
against conscience, until he is distressed almost to death, and 
still he will not yield ; and now some one comes in, " Oh, I hate 
to see you feel so bad, do not be so distressed, cheer up, cheer 
up, religion does not consist in being gloomy, be comforted." 
Horrid ! 

5. Whatever involves the subject of religion in mystery, is 
calculated to give a sinner false comfort. 

When a sinner is anxious on the subject of religion, very 
often, if you becloud it in mystery, he will feel relieved. The 
sinner's distress arises from the pressure of present obligation. 
Enlighten him on this point, and clear it up, and if he will not 
yield, it will only increase his distress. But tell him that re- 
generation is all a mystery, something he cannot understand ; 
and leave him all in a fog of darkness, and you relieve his 
anxiety. It is his clear view of the nature and duty of re- 
pentance, that produces his distress. It is the light that 
brings agony to his mind, while he refuses to obey. It is that, 
which will make up the pains of hell. And it will almost 
make hell in the sinner's breast here, if only made clear 
enough. But only cover up this light, and his anxiety will 
immediately become far less acute and thrilling. But if you 
lift up a certain and clear light, and flash it abroad upon his 
soul, and if he will not yield, you kindle up the tortures of 
hell in his bosom, 

6. Whatever relieves the sinner from a sense of blame, is cal- 
culated to give him false comfort. 

The more a man feels himself to blame, the deeper is his 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 325 

distress. But anything that lessons his sense of blame, of 
course lessons his distress, but it is a comfort full of death. 
If anything will help him divide the blame, and throw off a 
part of it upon God, it will afford comfort, but it is a relief 
that will destroy his soul. 

7. To tell him of his inability, is false comfort. Tell an anx- 
ious sinner " What can you do ? you are a poor, feeble crea- 
ture, you can do nothing." You will make him feel a kind of 
despondency. But it is not that keen agony of remorse, with 
which God wrings the soul, when he is laboring to cut him 
down and bring him to repentance. 

If you tell him he is unable to comply with the Gospel, he 
naturally falls in with it as a relief. He says to himself, "Yes, 
I am unable, I am a poor, feeble creature, I cannot do this, and 
certainly God cannot send me to hell for not doing what I 
cannot do." Why, if I believed that the sinner was unable, I 
would tell him plainly, " Do not be afraid, you are not to blame 
for not complying with the call of the Gospel : for you are 
unable, and God will never send you to hell for not doing 
what you have no strength to do. Will not the Judge of 
all the earth do right ? " I know it is not common for those 
who talk about the sinner's being unable, to be so consistent, 
and carry out their theory. But the sinner infers all this, and 
so he feels relieved. It is all false, and all the comfort de- 
rived from it, is only treasuring up wrath against the day of 
wrath. 

8. Whatever makes the impression on a sinner's mind that 
he is to be passive in religion, is calculated to give him false 
comfort. 

Give him the idea that he has nothing to do but to wait 
God's time ; tell him conversion is the work of God, and he 
ought to leave it to him ; and that he must be careful, not to 
try to take the work out of God's hand ; and he will infer, as 
before, that he is not to blame, and will feel relieved. If he is 
only to hold still, and let God do the work, just as a man 
holds still to have his arm amputated, he feels relieved. But 
such instruction as this, is all wrong. If the sinner is thus to 
hold still and let God do it, he instantly infers that he is not 
to blame for not doing it himself. And the inference is not 
only natural but legitimate, for he is not to blame. 

It is true that there is a sense in which conversion is the 
work of God. But it is false, as it is often represented. It 
is also true that there is a sense, in which conversion is the 
sinner's own act. It is ridiculous, therefore, to say, that a 
sinner is passive in regeneration, or passive in being convert- 



326 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

ed, for conversion is his own act. The thing to be done is 
that which cannot be done for him. It is something which he 
must do, or it will never be done. 

9. Telling a sinner to wait God's time. 
' Some years ago, I met a woman in Philadelphia, who was 
anxious about her soul, and had been a long time in that 
state. I conversed with her, and endeavored to learn her 
state. She told me a good many things, and finally said she 
knew she ought to be willing to wait on God as long as he 
had waited upon her. She said, God had waited on her a 
great many years, before she would give any attention to his 
calls, and now she believed it was her duty to wait God's time 
to show mercy and convert her soul. And she said, this was 
the instruction she had received. She must be patient, and 
wait God's time, and by and by he would give her relief. Oh, 
amazing folly ! 

Here is the sinner in rebellion. God comes with pardon in 
one hand, and a sword in the other, and tells the sinner to 
repent and receive pardon, or refuse and perish. And now 
here comes a minister of the Gospel, and tells the sinner to 
" wait God's time." Virtually he says, that God is not ready 
to have him repent now, and is not ready to pardon him now, 
and thus, in fact, throws off the blame of his impenitence 
upon God. Instead of pointing out the sinner's guilt, in not 
submitting at once to God, he points out God's insincerity in 
making the offer, when, in fact, he was not ready to grant the 
blessing. 

I have often thought such teachers needed the rebuke of 
Elijah when he met the priests of Baal. " Cry aloud, for he 
is a God ; either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a 
journey ; or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awaked." 
The minister who ventures to intimate that God is not ready, 
and that tells the sinner to wait God's time, might almost as 
well tell him, that now God is asleep, or gone on a journey, 
and cannot attend to him at present. Miserable comforters 
indeed ! It is little less than outrageous blasphemy of God. 
How many have gone to the judgment, red all over with the 
blood of souls, that they have deceived and destroyed, by tell- 
ing them God was not ready to save them, and they must 
wait God's time. No doubt, such a doctrine is exceedingly 
calculated to afford present relief to an anxious sinner. It 
warrants him to say, " Oh, yes, God is not ready, I must wait 
God's time and so I can live in sin, and take it out a while 
longer, till he gets ready to attend to me, and then I will get 
religion." 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 327 

10. It is false comfort to tell an anxious sinner to do any- 
thing for relief, ivhidi he can do, and not submit his heart to 
God, 

An anxious sinner is often willing to do anything else, but 
the very thing which God requires him to do. He is willing 
to go to the ends of the earth, or to pay his money, or to en- 
dure suffering, or anything, but full and instantaneous sub- 
mission to God. Now, if you will compromise the matter 
with him, and tell him of something else that he may do, and 
yet evade that point, he will be very much comforted. He 
Ukes that instruction. He says, " Oh, yes, I will do that, I like 
that minister, he is not so severe as others, he seems to un- 
derstand my particular case, and knows how to make allow- 
ances." 

It often reminds me of the conduct of a patient who is 
Very sick, but has a great dislike for a certain physician and 
a particular medicine, but that is the very physician who alone 
understands treating his disease, and that the only remedy 
for it. Now the patient is willing to do anything else, and 
call in any other physician ; and he is anxious and in dis- 
tress, and is asking all his friends if they cannot tell him what 
he shall do, and he will take all the nostrums and quack 
medicines in the country, before he will submit to the only 
course that can bring him relief. By and by, after he has 
tried everything without any benefit, if he does not die in the 
experiment, he gives up his unreasonable opposition, calls in 
the physician, takes the proper medicine, and is cured. Just 
so it is with sinners. They will eagerly do anything, if you 
will let them off from this intolerable pressure of present ob- 
ligation to submit to God. I will mention a few of the 
things which sinners are told to do. 

(1.) Telling a sinner he must use the means. Tell an anx- 
ious sinner this — You must use the means, and he is relieved. 
"Oh, yes, I will do that, if that is all. I thought that God 
required me to repent and submit to him now. But if using 
the means will answer, I will do that with all my heart." 
He was distressed before, because he was cornered up, and 
did not know which way to turn. Conscience had beset him, 
like a wall of fire, and urged him to repent now. But this 
relieves him at once, and he feels better, and is very thankful, 
he says, that he found such a good adviser in his distress. But 
he may use the means, as he calls it, till the day of judg- 
ment, and not be a particle the better for it, but will only 
hasten his way to death. What is the sinner's use of means, 
but rebellion asrainst God? God uses means. The church 



328 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

uses means to convert and save sinners, to bear down upon 
them, and bring them to submission. But what has the sin- 
ner to do with using means ? Will you set him to use means 
back upon God, and so make an offset in the matter ? Or is 
he to use means to make himself submit to God ? How shall 
he go to work with his means to make himself submit ? It is 
just telling the sinner, " You need not submit to God now, 
but just use the means awhile, and see if you cannot melt 
God's heart down to you, so that he will yield this point of 
unconditional submission." It is a mere cavil to evade the 
duty of immediate submission to God. It is true that sin- 
ners, actuated by a regard to their own happiness, often give 
attention to the subject of religion, attend meetings, and pray, 
and read, and many such things. But in all this, they have 
no regard to the honor of God, nor do they so much as mean 
to obey him. Their design is not obedience, for if it were, 
they would not be impenitent sinners. They are not, there- 
fore, using means to be Christians, but to obtain pardon, and 
a hope. It is absurd to say that an impenitent sinner is using 
means to repent, for this is the same as to say that he is will- 
ing to repent, or, in other words, that he does repent, and is 
not an impenitent sinner. So, to say that an unconverted 
sinner uses means with design to become a Christian, is a con- 
tradiction, for it is saying that he is willing to be a Christian, 
which is the -same as to say that he is a Christian already. 

(2.) Telling the sinner to pray for a new heart. I once 
heard a celebrated Sunday-school teacher do this. He was 
almost the father of Sunday-schools in this country. He 
called a little girl up to him, and began to talk to her. "My 
little daughter, are you a Christian ? " No, sir. " Well, you 
cannot be a Christian yourself, can you?" No, sir. "No, 
you cannot be a Christian, you cannot change your heart 
yourself, but you must pray for a new heart, that is all you 
can do, pray to God, God will give you a new heart." He 
was an aged and venerable man, but I felt almost disposed to 
rebuke him openly in the name of the Lord, I could not bear 
to hear him deceive that child, telling her she could not be a 
Christian. Does God say " Pray for a new heart ?" Never. 
He says, "Make you a new heart." And the sinner is not to 
be told to pray to God to do his duty for him, but to go and 
do it himself. I know the Psalmist, a good man, prayed, 
" Create in me a clean heart, and renew a right spirit within 
me." He had faith and prayed in faith. But that is a very 
different thing from setting an obstinate rebel to pray for a 
new heart. No doubt, an anxious sinner will be delighted 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 329 

with such instruction. " Why, I knew I needed a new heart, 
and that I ought to repent, but I thought I must do it my- 
self, I am very willing to ask God to do it, I hated to do it 
myself, but have no objection that God should do it, if he 
will, and I will pray for it, if that is all that is required." 

(3. ) Telling the sinner to persevere. And suppose he does 
persevere. He is as certain to be damned as if he had been 
in hell ever since the foundation of the world. His anxiety 
arises only from his resistance, and if he would submit, it 
would cease. And now, will you tell him to persevere in the 
very thing that causes his distress ? Suppose my child 
should, in a fit of passion, throw a book or something on the 
floor. I tell him " Take it up," and instead of minding what 
I say, he runs off and plays. " Take it up ! " He sees I am 
in earnest, and begins to look serious. " Take it up, or I 
shall get a rod." And I put up my arm to get the rod. He 
stands stilL " Take it up, or you must be whipped." He 
comes slowly along to the place, and then begins to weep. 
" Take it up, my child, or you will certainly be punished." 
Now he is in distress, and sobs and sighs as if his bosom 
would burst, but still remains as stubborn as if he knew I 
could not punish him. Now I begin to press him with mo- 
tives to submit and obey, but there he stands, in agony, and 
at length bursts out, " Oh, father, I do feel so bad, I think I 
am growing better." And now, suppose a neighbor to come 
in, and see the child standing there, in all this agony of stub- 
bornness. The neighbor asks him what he is standing there 
for, and what he is doing. " Oh, I am using means to pick 
up that book." If this neighbor should tell the child, " Per- 
severe, persevere, my boy, you will get it by and by," what 
should I do? Why, I would turn him out of the house. 
What does he mean by encouraging my child in his rebel- 
lion ? 

Now, God calls the sinner to repent, he threatens him, he 
draws the glittering sword, he persuades him, he uses mo- 
tives, and the sinner is distressed to agony, for he sees him- 
self driven to the dreadful alternative of giving up his sins 
or going to hell. He ought instantly to lay down his weap* 
ons, and break his heart at once. But he resists, and strug- 
gles against conviction, and that creates his distress. Now 
will you tell him to persevere ? Persevere in what ? In strug- 
gling against God ! That is just the direction the devil would 
give. All the devil wants is to see him persevere in just the 
way he is going on, and his destruction is sure. Satan may 
go to sleep. 



330 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

(4.) Telling the sinner to 2 )ress forward. That is, "You 
are in a good way, only press forward, and you will get to 
heaven." This is on the supposition that his face is towards 
heaven, when in fact his face is towards hell, and he is press- 
ing forward, and never more rapidly than now, while he is 
resisting the Holy Ghost. Often have I heard this direction 
given, when the sinner was in as bad a way as he could be. 
"What you ought to tell him is, " STOP — sinner, stop, do not 
take another step that way, it leads to hell." God tells him 
to stop, and because he does not wish to stop, he is distressed. 
Now, why should you attempt to comfort him in this way ? 

(5.) Tell a sinner that he must try to repent and give his heart 
to God. " Oh, yes," says the sinner, "I am willing to try, I have 
often tried to do it, and I will try again." Ah, does God 
tell you to try to repent ? All the world would be willing 
to try to repent, in their way. Giving this direction implies 
that it is very difficult to repent, and perhaps impossible, and 
that the best thing a sinner can do is to try and see whether 
he can do it or not. "What is this but substituting your own 
commandment in the place of God's. God requires nothing 
short of repentance and a holy heart. Anything short of 
that is comforting him in vain, " seeing in your answers there 
remaineth falsehood." 

(6.) To tell him to pray for repentance. "Oh yes, I will 
pray for repentance, if that is all. I was distressed because 
I thought God required me to repent, but if he will do it, I 
can wait." And so he feels relieved, and is quite comfortable. 

(7.) To tell a sinner to pray for conviction, or pi % ay for the 
Holy Ghost to show him his sins, or to labor to get more light 
on the subject of his guilt, in order to increase his convic- 
tion. 

All this is just what the sinner wants, because it lets him 
off from the pressure of present obligation. He wants just a 
little more time. Anything that will defer that present pres- 
sure of obligation to repent immediately is a relief. What 
does he want more conviction for ? Does God give any such 
^direction to an impenitent sinner ? God takes it for granted 
that he has conviction enough already. And so he has. Do 
you say he cannot realize all his sins ? If he can realize only 
one of them, let him repent of that one, and he is a Chris- 
tian. Suppose he could see them all, what reason is there to 
think he would repent of them all, any more than that he 
would repent of that one that he does see ? All this is com- 
forting the sinner by setting him to do that which he can do, 
and will not submit his heart to God. 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 331 

11. Another way in which false comfort is given to anx- 
ious sinners, is to tell them God is trying their faith by keep- 
ing them in the furnace, and they must wait patiently upon 
the Lord. Just as if God was in fault, or stood in the way, 
of his being a Christian. Or as if an impenitent sinner had 
faith ! What an abomination ! Suppose somebody should 
tell my child, while he was standing by the book as I have de- 
scribed, "Wait patiently, boy, your father is trying your 
faith." No. The sinner is trying the patience and forbear- 
ance of God. God is not setting himself to torture a sinner, 
and teach him a lesson of patience. But he is waiting upon 
him, and laboring to bring him at once into such a state of 
mind as will render it consistent to fill his soul with the 
peace of heaven. And shall the sinner be encouraged to re- 
sist by the idea that God is bantering? TAKE CAEE. God 
has said his Spirit shall not always strive. 

12. Another false comfort is telling a sinner, Do your duty, 
and leave your conversion with God. 

I once heard an elder of a church say to an anxious sin- 
ner, " Do your duty, and leave your conversion to God, he 
will do it in his own time and way." That was just the same 
as telling him that it was not his duty to be converted now. 
He did not say, Do your duty, and leave your salvation with 
God. That would have been proper enough, for it would 
have been simply telling him to submit to God, and would 
have included conversion as the first duty of all. But he 
told him to leave his conversion to God. And this elder, that 
gave such advice, was a man of liberal education too. How 
absurd ! Just as if he could do his duty and not be con- 
verted. Just as if God was going to convert a sinner and 
let the sinner sit calmly under it in the use of means. Hor- 
rible ! No. God has required him to make him a new heart, 
and do you beware how you comfort him with an answer of 
falsehood. 

13. Sometimes professors of religion will try to comfort a 
sinner, by telling him, "Do not be discouraged ; I ivas a Jong 
time in this icay before I found comfort." They will tell him, 
" I w T as under conviction so many weeks — or perhaps so many 
months, or sometimes years, and have gone through with all 
this, and know just how yqn feel, your experience is the same 
with mine, precisely, and after so long a time I found relief, 
and I do not doubt you will find it by and by. Do not de- 
spair, God will comfort you soon." Tell a sinner to take 
courage in his rebellion ! Oh, horrible ! Such professors 
ought to be ashamed. Suppose you were under conviction 



332 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

so many weeks, and afterwards found relief, it is the very last 
thing you ought to tell to an anxious sinner. What is it but 
encouraging him to hold on, when his business is to submit. 
Did you hold out so many weeks while the Spirit was striv- 
ing with you ? You only deserved so much the more to be 
damned, for your obstinacy and stupidity. 

Sinner ! it is no sign God will spare you so long, or that 
his Spirit will remain with you to be resisted. And remem- 
ber, if the Spirit is taken away, you will be sent to hell. 
14 " I have faith to believe you will be converted." 
You have faith to believe ! On what does your faith rest ? 
On the promise of God ? On the influences of the Holy 
Ghost ? Then you are counteracting your own faith. The 
very design and object of the Spirit of God, is, to tear away 
from the sinner his last vestige of a hope, while remaining 
in sin ; to annihilate every crag and twig he may cling to. 
And the object of your instruction should be the same. You 
should fall in with the plan of God. It is only in this way 
that you can ever do any good, by crowding him right up to 
the work, to submit at once and leave his soul in the hands 
of God. But when one that he thinks is a Christian tells 
him, " I have faith to believe you will be converted," it up- 
holds him in his false expectation. Instead of tearing him 
away from his false hopes, and throwing him upon Christ, 
you just turn him off to hang upon your faith, and find com- 
fort because you have faith for him. This is all false com- 
fort, that worketh death. 

15. "I will pray for you." Sometimes professors of religion 
try to comfort an anxious sinner in this way, by telling him, 
" I will pray for you." This is false comfort, for it leads the 
sinner to trust in those prayers, instead of trusting in Christ. 
The sinner says, "He is a good man, and God hears the 
prayers of good men, no doubt his prayers will prevail some 
time, and I shall be converted, I do not think I shall be lost." 
And his anxiety, his agony, is all gone. A woman said to a 
minister, "I have no hope now, but I have faith in your 
prayers." Just such faith, this is, as the devil wants them 
to have — faith in prayers instead of faith in Christ. 

16. " I rejoice to see you in this way, and I hope you will 
be faithful, and hold out." What is that but rejoicing to see 
him in rebellion against God? For that is precisely the 
ground on which he stands. He is resisting conviction, and 
resisting conscience, and resisting the Holy Ghost, and yet 
you rejoice to see him in this way, and hope he will be faith- 
ful and hold out. There is a sense, indeed, in which it may 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINGERS. 333 

be said that his situation is more hopeful than when he was 
in stupidity. For God has convinced him, and may succeed 
in turning and subduing him. But that is not the sense in 
which the sinner himself will understand it. He will suppose 
that you think him in a hopeful way, because he is doing bet- 
ter than formerly. When his guilt and danger are, in fact, 
greater than they ever were before. And instead of rejocing, 
you ought to be distressed and in agony, to see him thus re- 
sisting the Holy Ghost, for every moment he does this, he is 
in danger of being left of God, and given up to hardness of 
heart and to despair. 

17. " You will have your pay for this, by and by, God will 
reward you." Yes, sinners, God will reward you, if you con- 
tinue in this way, he will put you in the fires of helL Re- 
ward for all this distress ! Yes, if you are ever rewarded for 
it, it will be in hell. I once heard a sinner say, " I feel very 
bad, I have strong hopes that I shall get my reward." But 
that individual afterwards said, " Nowhere can there be found 
so black a sinner as I am, and no sin of my life seems so 
black, and damning as that expression." He was overwhelmed 
with contrition, that he should ever have had such an idea, 
as to think God would reward him for suffering so much 
distress, when he brought it all upon himself, needlessly, by 
his wicked resistance to the truth. The truth is, what such 
people want, is to comfort, the sinner, and being all in the 
dark themselves on the subject of religion, they of course 
give him false comfort. 

18. Another false comfort, is to tell the sinner he Jias not re- 
pented enough. The truth is, he has not repented at all. God 
always comforts the sinner as soon as he repents. This direc- 
tion implies that his feelings are right as far as they go. To 
imply that he has any repentance, is to tell him a He, and 
cheat him out of his souL 

19. People sometimes comfort a sinner by telling him " If 
you are elected, you will be brought in." I once heard of a 
case where a person under great distress of mind was sent to 
converse with a neighboring minister. They conversed a 
long time. As the person went away, the minister said to 
him, "I should like to write a line by you, to your father." 
His father was a pious man. The minister wrote the letter, 
and forgot to seal it. As the sinner was going home, he saw 
that the letter was not sealed, and he thought to himself, 
that probably the minister had written about him, and his 
curiosity at length led him to open and read it. And there 
he found it written to this purport : " Dear sir, I find your 



334 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

son under conviction, and in great distress, and it seems not 
easy to say anything to give him relief. But, if he is one of 
the elect, he will surely be brought in." He wanted to say 
something to comfort the father. But now, mark. That 
letter had well-nigh ruined his soul. He settled down 
on the doctrine of election — " If I am elected, I shall be 
brought in," and his conviction was all gone. Years after- 
wards he was awakened and converted, but only after a great 
struggle, and never until that false impression was obliter- 
ated from his mind, and he was made to see that he had no- 
thing at all to do with the doctrine of election, but if he did 
not repent, he would be damned. 

20. It is very common for some people to tell an awakened 
sinner, " You are in a very prosperous way, I am glad to see 
you so, and feel encouraged about you." It sometimes seems 
as if the church were in league with the devil to help sinners 
resist the Holy Ghost. The thing that the Holy Ghost wants 
to make the sinner feel, is, that all his ways are wrong, and 
that they lead to hell. And everybody is conspiring to make 
the opposite impression. The Spirit is trying to discourage 
him, and they are trying to encourage him ; the Spirit to 
distress, by showing him he is all wrong, and they to comfort 
him by saying he is doing well. Has it come to this, that 
the .worst counteraction to the truth, and the greatest obstacle 
to the Spirit shall spring from the church ? Sinner ! Do 
not believe any such thing. You are not in a hopeful way. 
You are not doing well, but ill ; as ill as you can, while resist- 
ing the Holy Ghost. 

21. Another very fatal way in which false comfort is given 
to sinners, is by applying to them certain Scripture promises, 
which were designed only for saints. This is a grand device 
of the devil. It is much practised by the Universalists. But 
Christians often do it. For example : 

(1.) "Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be com-> 
forted." How often has this passage been applied to anxious 
sinners, who were in distress because they would not submit 
to God ; blessed are ye that mourn. Indeed ! That is true, 
where they mourn with godly sorrow. But what is this sin- 
ner mourning about ? He is mourning because God's law 
is holy and his terms of salvation so fixed that he cannot 
bring them down to his mind. Tell such a rebel — Blessed 
are they that mourn ! You might just as well apply it to 
those that are in hell. There is mourning there too. The 
sinner is mourning because there is no other way of salvation, 
because God is so holy that he requires him to give up all 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 335 

his sins, and he feels, that the time has come, that he must 
either give them up, or be damned. Shall we tell him, he 
shall be comforted ? Go and tell the devil, " Poor devil, yon 
mourn now, but the Bible says you are blessed if you mourn, 
and you shall be comforted by and by. 

(2.) " They that seek shall find." This is said to sinners 
in such a way as to imply that the anxious sinner is seeking 
religion. This promise was made in reference to Christians, 
who ask in faith, and seek to do the will of God, and is not 
applicable to those who are seeking hope or comfort, but to 
holy seeking. To apply it to an impenitent sinner, is only to 
deceive him, for his seeking is not of this character. To tell 
him " You are seeking, are you ? Well, seek, and you shall 
find," is to cherish a fatal delusion. While he remains im- 
penitent, he has not a desire, which the devil might not have, 
and remain a devil still. 

If he had desire to do his duty, if he was seeking to do 
the will of God, and give up his sins, he would be a Chris- 
tian. But to comfort an impenitent sinner, with such a 
promise, you might just as well comfort Satan. 

(3.) "Be not weary in well doing, for in due time you 
shall reap if you faint not." To apply this to a sinner for 
comfort, is absurd. Just as if he was doing something to 
please God. He has never done well, and never has done 
more ill, than now. Suppose my neighbor, who came in 
while I was trying to subdue my child, should say to the 
child, " In due time you shall reap, if you faint not," what 
should I say ? " Beap, yes, you shall reap, if you do not 
give up your obstinacy, you shall reap indeed, for I will ap- 
ply the rod." So the struggling sinner shall reap the dam- 
nation of hell, if he does not give up his sins . 

22. Some professors of religion, when they attempt to con- 
verse with awakened sinners, are very fond of saying, "I 
will tell you my experience." This is a dangerous snare, and 
often gives the devil a handle to lead him to hell, by trying to 
copy your experience. If you tell it to him, and he thinks it 
is a Christian experience, he will almost infallibly be trying 
to imitate it, and instead of following the Gospel, or the 
leadings of the Spirit in his own soul, he is following your 
example. This is absurd as well as dangerous. He never 
will have just such feelings as you had. No two persons 
were ever exercised just alike. Men's experiences are as much 
unlike as then- countenances. Such a course is very likely to 
mislead him. The design is, often, nothing but to encour- 
age him, at the very point where he ought not to be encour- 



330 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SIGNERS. 

aged, before he lias submitted to God. And it is calculated 
to impede the work of God in his Soul. 

23. How many times will people tell an awakened sinner 
that God has begun a good work in him, and he will carry it 
on. I have known parents talk so with their children, and as 
soon as they saw their children awakened, give up all former 
anxiety about them, and settle down at their ease, thinking 
that now God had begun a good work in their children, he 
would carry it on. It would be just as rational for a farmer 
to say so about his grain, and as soon as it comes up out of 
the ground, say, " Well, God has begun a good work in my 
field, and he will carry it on." What would be thought of a 
farmer who should neglect to put up his fence, because God 
had begun the work of giving him a crop of grain ? If you 
tell a sinner so, and he believes you, it will certainly be his 
destruction, for it will prevent his doing that which is abso- 
lutely indispensable to his being saved. If, as soon as the 
sinner is awakened, he is taught that now God has begun a 
good work, that only needs to be carried on, and that God 
will surely carry it on, he sees that he has no further occa- 
sion to be anxious, for, in fact, he has nothing more to do. 
And so he will be relieved from that intolerable pressure of 
present obligation, to repent and submit to God. And if he 
is relieved from his sense of obligation to do it, he will never do it. 

24. Some will tell the sinner, " Well, you have broken off 
your sins, have you ?" " Oh, yes," says the sinner. When 
it is all false, he has never forsaken his sins for a moment, he 
has only exchanged one form of sin for another ; only placed 
himself in a new attitude of resistance. And to tell him, he 
has broken them off, is to give him false comfort. 

25. Sometimes this direction is given for the purpose of re- 
lieving the agony of an anxious sinner, " Do what you can, 
and God will do the rest," or " Do what you can, and God 
will help you." This is the same as telling a sinner, "You 
cannot do what God requires you to do, but if you will do 
what you can, God will help you, as to the rest." Now sin- 
ners often get the idea that they have done all they can, when, 
in fact, they have done nothing at all, only resisted God 
with all their might. I have often heard them say, " I have 
done all I can, and I get no relief, what can I do more ?" 
Now, you can see how comforting it must be to such a one to 
have a professor of religion come in and say, " If you will do 
what you can, God will help you." It relieves all his keen 
distress at once. He may be uneasy, and unhappy, but his 
agony is gone. 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 337 

26. Again they say, " You should be thankful for what you 
have, and hope for more." If the shiner is convicted, they 
tell him he should be thankful for conviction, and hope for 
conversion. If he has any feeling, he should be thankful for 
tv hat feeling he has, just as if his feeling was religious feeling, 
when he has no more religion, than Satan. He has reason 
to be thankful, indeed ; thankful that he is out of hell, and 
thankful that God is yet waiting on him. But it is ridiculous 
to tell him he should be thankful in regard to the state of his 
mind, when he is all the while resisting his Maker with all his 
might. 

ERRORS IN PRAYING FOR SINNERS. 

I will here mention a few errors in praying for sinners in 
their presence, by which an unhappy impression is made on 
their minds, in consequence of which, they often obtain false 
comfort in their distress. 

1. People sometimes pray for sinners, as if they deserved 
to be pitied more than blamed. They pray for them as 
mourners. " Lord help these pensive mourners," as if they 
were just mourning, like one that had lost a friend, or met 
some other calamity, and they could not help it, and were 
very sorry for it, but death would come, and so they were 
greatly to be pitied, as they were sitting there, sad, pensive, 
and sighing. The Bible never talks so. It pities sinners, 
but it pities them as mad and guilty rebels, guilty, and de- 
serving to go to hell, not as poor pensive mourners, that can- 
not help it, that want to be relieved, but can do nothing but 
sit and mourn. 

2. Praying for them as poor sinners. Does the Bible ever 
use any such language as this ? The Bible never speaks of 
them as " poor sinners," as if they deserved to be pitied more 
than blamed. Christ pities sinners in his heart. And so does 
God pity them. He feels in his heart, all the gushings of 
compassion for them, when he sees them going on, obstinate 
and wilful in gratifying their own lusts, at the peril of his 
eternal wrath. But he never lets an expression escape from 
him, as if the sinner was just a " poor creature" to be pitied, 
as if he could not help it. The idea that he is poor, rather 
than wicked, unfortunate, rather than guilty, relieves the sin- 
ner greatly. I have seen the sinner writhe with agony under 
the truth, in a meeting, until somebody begun to pray for 
him as a poor creature. And then he would gush out into 
tears, and weep profusely, and think he was greatly benefited 

15 



338 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

by such a prayer. " Ob, what a good prayer that was." If 
you go now and converse with that sinner, you will find he is 
pitying himself as a poor unfortunate creature, perhaps weep- 
ing over his unhappy condition, but his convictions of sin, his 
deep impressions of awful guilt, are all gone. 

3. Praying that God would help the sinner to repent " O 
Lord, enable this poor sinner to repent now" This conveys 
the idea to the sinner's mind, that he is now trying with all 
his might to repent, and that he cannot do it, and therefore 
Christians are calling on God to help him, and enable him to 
do it. Most professors of religion pray for sinners, not that 
God would make them willing to repent, but that he would 
enable them, or make them able. No wonder their prayers 
are not heard. They relieve the sinner of his sense of re- 
sponsibility, and that relieves his distress. But it is an insult 
to God, as if God had commanded a sinner to do what he 
could not do. 

4. People sometimes pray : " Lord, these sinners are seek- 
ing thee, sorrowing" This language is an allusion to what 
took place at the time when Jesus was a little boy, and went 
into the temple to talk with the rabbis and doctors. His 
parents, you recollect, went a day's journey towards home, 
before they missed him, and then they turned back, and after 
looking all around, they found the little Jesus standing in the 
temple and disputing with the learned men, and his mpther 
said to him, " Son, why has thou thus dealt with us ? behold, 
thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing" And so this 
prayer represents sinners as seeking Jesus, and he hides him- 
self from them, and they look all around, and hunt, and try 
to find him, and wonder where Jesus is, and say, " Lord, we 
have sought Jesus these three days sorrowing." It is a LIE. 
No sinner ever sought Jesus with all his heart three days, or 
three minutes, and could not find him. There Jesus stands 
at his door and knocks, there he is right before him pleading 
with him, and facing him down with all his false pretences. 
Seeking him ! The sinner may whine and cry, " Oh, how I 
am sorrowing, and seeking Jesus." It is no such thing ; 
Jesus is seeking you. And yet how many oppressed con- 
sciences are relieved and comforted by hearing one of these 
prayers. 

5. " Lord, have mercy on these sinners, who are seeking thy 
love to know" This is a favorite expression with many, as if 
sinners were seeking to know the love of Christ, and could 
not. No such thing. They are not seeking the love of 
Christ, but seeking to get to heaven without Jesus Christ. 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 339 

Just as if they were seeking it, and he was so hard-hearted 
that he would not let them have it. 

6. "Lord, have mercy on these penitent souls;" calling 
anxious sinners penitent souls. If they are penitent, they 
are Christians. To make an impression on an unconverted 
sinner that he is penitent, is to make him believe a lie. But 
it is very comforting to the sinner, and he likes to take it up, 
and pray it over again, " O Lord, I am a poor penitent soul, 
I am very penitent, I am so distressed, Lord have mercy on 
a poor penitent." Dreadful delusion ! 

7. Sometimes people pray for anxious sinners as humble 
souls. "O Lord, these sinners have humbled themselves." 
Why, that is not true, they have not humbled themselves ; if 
they had, the Lord would have raised them up and comforted 
them, as he has promised. There is a hymn of this character, 
that has done great mischief. It begins, 

" Come humble sinner in whose breast 
A thousand thoughts revolve." 

This hymn was once given by a minister to an awakened sin- 
ner, as one applicable to his case. He began to read, " Come 
humble sinner." He stopped, "Humble sinner, that is not 
applicable to me, I am not a humble sinner." Ah, how well 
was it for him that the Holy Ghost had taught him better 
than the hymn. If the hymn had said, Come anxious sinner, 
or guilty sinner, or trembling sinner, it would have been well 
enough, but to call him a humble sinner would not do. There 
are a vast many hymns of the same character. It is very 
common to find sinners quoting the false sentiments of some 
hymn, to excuse themselves in rebellion against God. 

A minister told me he heard a prayer, quite lately, in these 
words, "O Lord, these sinners -have humbled themselves, and 
come to thee as well as they know how. If they knew any 
better, they would do better, but O Lord, as they have come 
to thee, in the best manner they can, we pray thee accept 
them and shew mercy." Horrible ! 

8. Many pray, " Father, forgive them, they know not what 
they do." This is the prayer which Christ made for his mur- 
derers. And, in that case, it was true, they did not know 
what they were doing, for they did not believe that Jesus 
Christ was the Messiah. But it cannot be said of sinners 
under the Gospel, they do not know what they are doing. 
They do know what they are doing. They do not see the full 
extent of it, but they do know that they are sinning against 
God, and rejecting Christ, and the difficulty is, that they are 



340 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

unwilling to submit to God. But such a prayer is calculated 
to make him feel relieved, and make him say, " Lord, how can 
you blame me so, I am a poor ignorant creature, I do not 
knoiv how to do what is required of me. If I knew how, I 
would do it." 

9. Another expression is, " Lord, direct these sinners, who 
are inquiring the way to Zion, with their faces thitherward." 
But this language is only applicable to Christians. Sinners 
have not their faces towards Zion, their faces are set toward 
hell. And how can a sinner be said to be " inquiring the way" 
to Zion, when he has no disposition to go there. The real 
difficulty is, that he is unwilling to WALK in the way in 
which he knows he ought to go. 

10. People pray that sinners may have more conviction. Or, 
they pray that sinners may go home solemn and tender, and 
take the subject into consideration, instead of praying that 
they may repent now. Or, they pray as if they supposed the 
sinner was willing to do what is required. All such prayers, 
are just such prayers as the devil wants. He wishes to have 
such prayers, and I dare say he does not care how many such 
are offered. 

Sometimes I have seen in an anxious meeting, or when sin- 
ners have been called to the anxious seats, and the minister has 
made the way of salvation all plain to them, and taken away 
all the stumbling blocks out of their path, and removed the 
darkness of their minds on the several points, and when they 
are just ready to yield, some one will be called on to pray, 
and instead of praying that they may repent now, he begins 
to pray, " O Lord, we pray, that these sinners may be solemn, 
that they may have a deep sense of their sinfulness, that they 
may go home impressed with their lost condition, that they 
may attempt nothing in their own strength, that they may not 
lose their convictions, and that, in thine own time and way, 
they may be brought out into the glorious light and liberty of 
the sons of God." 

Instead of bringing them right up to the point of immediate 
submission, on the spot, it gives them time to breathe, it lets 
off all the pressure of conviction, and he breathes freely again 
and feels relieved, and sits down at his ease. Thus, when the 
sinner is brought up, as it were, and stands at the gate of 
heaven, such a prayer, instead of pushing him in, sets him 
away back again, — " There, poor thing, sit there till God helps 
you." 

11. Christians sometimes pray in such a manner as to make 
the impression that Christ is the sinner's friend, in a differ- 



FALSE COMFOETS FOR SINNEES. 341 

ent sense from what God the Father is. They pray to him, 
" Oh, thou friend of sinners," as if God was full of wrath, and 
stern vengeance, just going to crush the poor wretch, till Jesus 
Christ comes in and takes his part, and delivers him. Now 
this is all wrong. The Father and the Son are perfectly 
agreed, their feelings are all the same, and both are equally 
disposed to have sinners saved. And to make such an im- 
pression, deceives the sinner, and leads to wrong feelings to- 
wards God. To represent God the Father as standing over 
him, with the sword of justice in his hand, eager to strike the 
blow, till Christ interposes, is not true. The Father is as 
much the sinner's friend as the Son. His compassion is equal. 
But if the sinner gets this unfavorable idea of God the Father, 
how is he ever to love him with all his heart, so as to say, 
"Abba, Father." 

12. The impression is often made by the manner of praying, 
that you do not expect sinners to repent now, or that you ex- 
pect God to do their duty, or that you wish to encourage 
them to trust in your prayers. And so,' sinners are ruined. 
Never pray so as to make the impression on sinners, that you 
secretly hope they are Christians already, or that you feel a 
strong confidence they will be, by and by, or that you half 
believe they are converted now. This is always unhappy. 
Multitudes are deceived with false comfort, in this way, and 
prevented, just at the critical point, from making the final sur- 
render of themselves to God. 

Brethren, I find this field so broad that I cannot possibly 
mention all I wished to say. There are many other things 
that I intended to touch upon this evening, but the time is 
too far spent. I must close with a few brief 



REMARKS; 

1. Many persons who deal in this way with anxious sinners, 
do it from, false pity. They feel so much sympathy and com- 
passion that they cannot bear to tell them the truth, which is 
necessary to save them. As well might a surgeon, when he 
sees that a man's arm must be amputated, or he will die, in- 
dulge this feeling of false pity, and just put on a plaster, and 
give him an opiate. There is no benevolence in that. True 
benevolence would lead the surgeon to hide his feelings, and 
to be cool and calm, and with a keen knife, cut the limb off, 
and save the life. It is false tenderness to do anything short 
of that. I once saw a woman under distress of mind, who 
had been well nigh driven to despair for months. Her friends 



342 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINKERS. 

had tried all these false comforts without effect, and they 
brought her to see a minister. She was emaciated, and worn 
out with agony. The minister set his eye upon her, and poured 
in the truth upon her mind, and rebuked her in a most point- 
ed manner. The woman who was with her interfered, she 
thought it cruel, and said, " Oh, do comfort her, she is so dis- 
tressed, do not trouble her any more, she cannot bear it." He 
turned, and rebuked her, and sent her away, and then poured 
in the truth upon the anxious sinner like fire, and in five 
minutes she was converted, and went home full of joy. The 
plain truth swept all her false notions away, and in a few mo- 
ments she was joyful in God. 

2. This treatment of anxious sinners, administering their 
false comfort, is, in fact, cruelty. It is cruel as the grave, as 
cruel as hell, for it is calculated to send the sinner down to 
its burning abyss. Christians feel compassion for the anxious, 
and so they ought. But the last thing they ought to do, is to 
flinch just at the point where it comes to a crisis. They should 
feel compassion, but they should show it just as the surgeon 
does, when he deliberately goes to work, in the right and best 
way, and cuts off the man's arm, and thus cures him and 
saves his life. Just so Christians should let the sinner see 
their compassion and tenderness, but they should take God's 
part, fully and decidedly. They should lay open to the sinner, 
the worst of his case, expose his guilt and danger, and then 
lead him right up to the cross, and insist on instant submis- 
sion. They must have firmness enough to do this work thor- 
oughly, and if they see the sinner distressed and in agony, 
still they must press him right on, and not give way in the 
least, however much he may be in agony, but still press on 
till he yield. 

To do this often requires nerve. I have often been placed 
in circumstances, to know this by experience. I have found 
myself surrounded by anxious sinners, in such distress, as to 
make every nerve tremble, some overcome with emotion and 
lying on the floor, some applying camphor to prevent their 
fainting, others shrieking out as if they were just going to hell. 
Now, suppose any one should give false comfort in such a case 
as this. Suppose he had not nerve enough to bring them 
right up to the point of instant and absolute submission. 
How unfit is such a man to be trusted in a case like this. 

3. Sometimes sinners become deranged through despair 
and anguish of mind. Where this is the case, it is almost 
always because those who deal with them try to encourage 
them with false comfort, and thus lead them to such a con- 



FALSE COMFORTS FOR SIGNERS. 343 

flict with tlie Holy Ghost. They try to hold them up, while 
God is trying to break them down. And by and by, the sin- 
ner's mind gets confused with this contrariety of influences, 
and he either goes deranged, or is driven to despair. 

4. If you are going to deal with sinners, remember that you 
are soon to meet them in judgment, and be sure to treat them 
in such a way that if they are lost, it will be their own fault. 
Do not try to comfort them with false notions now, and have 
them reproach you with it then. Better suppress your false 
sympathy, and let the naked truth cleave them asunder, joints 
and marrow, than to sooth them with false comfort, and be- 
guile them away from God. 

4. Sinner ! if you converse with any Christians, and they 
tell you to do anything, first ask, "If I do that, shall I be 
saved ? " You may be anxious and not be saved. You may 
pray, and not be saved. You may read your Bible, and not 
be saved. You may use means, in your way, and not be 
saved. Whatever they tell you to do, if you can do it and not 
be saved, do not attend to such instructions. They are cal- 
culated to give you false comfort, and divert your attention 
from the main thing to be done, and beguile you down to hell. 
Do not follow any such directions, lest you should die while 
doing it, and then there is no retrieve. 

Finally, never tell a sinner anything, or give him any direc- 
tion, that will lead him to stop short, or that does not include 
absolute submission to God. To let him stop at any point 
short of this, is infinitely dangerous. Suppose you are at an 
anxious meeting, or a prayer meeting, and tell a sinner to 
pray, or to read a book, or anything short of saving repent- 
ance, and he should fall and break his neck that night, of 
whom would his blood be required ? A youth in New Eng- 
land once met a minister in the street, and asked him what 
he should do to be saved. The minister told him to go home 
and go into his chamber, and kneel down and give his heart 
to God. " Oh, sir," said the boy, " I feel so bad, I am afraid 
I shall not live to get home." The minister saw his error, 
and felt the rebuke, thus unconsciously given by a child, and 
he told him, "Well, then, give your heart to God here, and 
go home to your chamber and tell him of it." 

Oh, it is enough to make one's heart bleed, to see so many 
miserable comforters for anxious sinners, in whose answers 
there remaineth falsehood. What a vast amount of spiritual 
quackeiy there is in this world, and how many " forgers of 
lies" there are, " physicians of no value," who know no better 
than to comfort sinners with false hopes, and delude them 



344 FALSE COMFORTS FOR SINNERS. 

with their "old wives' fables," and nonsense, or who give way 
to false tenderness and sympathy, till they have not firmness 
enough to see the sword of the Spirit applied, to cut men to 
the soul, and lay open the sinners naked heart. Alas ! that 
so many are ever put into the ministry, who have not skill 
enough to stand by and see the Spirit of God do its work, in 
breaking up the old foundations, and crushing ail the rotton 
hopes of a sinner, and breaking him all down at the feet 
of Jesus. 



LECTUKE XVIII. 



DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 
Text— What shall I do to be saved ?— Acts xyL 30. 

These are the words of the jailor at Philippi, the question 
which he put to Paul and Silas, who were then under his care 
as prisoners. Satan had, in many ways, opposed these ser- 
vants of God in their work of preaching the Gospel, and had 
been as often defeated and disgraced. But here, at Philippi, 
he devised a new and peculiar project for frustrating their 
labors. There was a certain woman at Philippi, who was pos- 
sessed with a spirit of divination, or in other words, the spirit 
of the devil, and brought her masters much gain by her sooth- 
saying. The devil set this woman to follow Paul and Silas 
about the streets, and as soon as they had begun to gain the 
attention of the people, she would come in and cry, " These 
men are the servants of the most high God, which show unto us 
the way of salvation." That is, she undertook to second the 
exhortations of the preachers, and added her testimony, as if 
to give additional weight to their instructions. The effect of 
it was just what Satan desired. The people all knew that 
this was a wicked, base woman, and when they heard her at- 
tempting to recommend this new preaching, they were dis- 
gusted, and concluded it was all of a piece. The devil knew 
that it would not do him any good, but would help their 
cause, to set such a person to oppose the preaching of the 
apostles, or to speak against it. The time had gone by, for 
that to succeed. And, therefore, he comes round the other 
way, and takes the opposite ground, and by setting her to 
praise them as the servants of God, and to bear her polluted 
testimony in favor of their instructions, he led people to sup- 
pose the apostles were of the same character with her, and 
had the same spirit that she had, and thus all their efforts 
were defeated. Paul saw that if things went on so, he should 
be totally baffled, and never succeed in establishing a church 
at Philippi. And he turns round to her, and commands the 
foul spirit, in the name of Jesus Christ, to come out of her. 
When her masters saw that the hope of their gains was gone, 
15* (345) - ' 



346 DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 

they raised a great persecution, and caught Paul and Silas, 
and made a great ado, and brought them before the magis- 
trates, and raised such a clamor that the magistrates shut 
them up in prison, and made their feet fast in the stocks. 

Thus, they thought they had put down the excitement. But 
at midnight Paul and Silas prayed and sang praises, and the 
prisoners heard them. This old prison that had so long 
echoed to the voice of blasphemy and oaths, now resounded 
with the praises of God, and these walls, that had stood so 
firm, now trembled under the power of prayer. The stocks 
were unloosed, the gates thrown open, and every one's bands 
broken. The jailor was aroused from his sleep, and when he 
saw the prison doors opened, as he knew that if the prison- 
ers had escaped he must pay for it with his life, he drew his 
sword, and was about to kill himself. But Paul, who had no 
notion of escaping clandestinely, cried out to him instantly, 
"Do thyself no harm, for we are all here." And the Jailor . 
called for a light, and sprang in, and came trembling, and 
fell down before his prisoners, Paul and Silas, and brought 
them out, and said, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" 

In my last lecture, I dwelt at some length on the false in- 
structions given to sinners under conviction, and the false 
comforts too often administered, and the erroneous instruc- 
tions which such persons receive. It is my design, to-night, 
to show what are the instructions that should be given to anx- 
ious sinners in order to their speedy and effectual conver- 
sion. Or, in other words, to explain to you, what answer 
should be given to those who make the inquiry, " What must 
I do to be saved ?" In doing it, I propose, 

L To show what is not a proper direction to be given to sin- 
ners, when they make the inquiry in the text. 

II. Show what is a proper answer to the inquiry. And, 

III. To specify several errors, which anxious sinners are apt 
to fall into. 

I. I am to show ivhat are not proper directions to be given 
to anxious sinners. 

No more important inquiry was ever made than this, " "What 
must I do to be saved ?" Mankind are apt enough to inquire 
" What shall I eat, and what shall I drink," and the question 
may be answered in various ways, with little danger. But 
when a sinner asks in earnest, " What must I do to be saved?" 
it is of infinite importance that he should receive the right 
answer. It is my desire, to-night, to tell you, professors of 
religion, what to answer to this inquiry, and to tell you, who 
are sinners ? what you must do to be saved. 



DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS, 347 

1. No direction should be given to a sinner, that will leave 
him still in the gall of bitterness and the bonds of iniquity. 
No answer is proper to be given, with which, if he com- 
plies, he would not go to heaven, if he should die the next 
moment. 

2. No direction should be given, that does not include a 
change of heart, or a right heart, or hearty obedience to 
Christ. In other words, nothing is proper, which does not 
imply actually becoming a Christian. Any direction that 
falls short of this, is of no use. It will not bring him 
any nearer to the kingdom, it will do no good, but will only 
lead him to defer the very thing which he must do, in order 
to be saved. The sinner should be told plainly, at once, what 
he must do, or die ; and he should be told nothing that does 
not include a right state of heart. Whatever you may do, 
sinner, that does not include a right heart, is sin. "Whether 
you read the Bible or not, it is sin, so long as you remain in 
rebellion. Whether you go to meeting, or stay away, whether 
you pray or not, it is nothing but rebellion, every moment. 
It is surprising, that a sinner should suppose himself doing 
God's services, when he prays, and reads his Bible. Should 
a rebel against this government, read the statute book, while 
he continues in rebellion, and has no design to obey ; should 
he ask for pardon, while he holds on to his weapons of re- 
sistance and warfare, would you think him doing his country 
a service, and laying them under obligations to show him favor? 
No, you would say that all his reading and praying, were only 
an insult to the majesty both of the lawgiver and the law. So 
you, sinner, while you remain in impenitence, are insulting 
God and setting him at defiance, whether you read his word 
and pray, or let it alone. No matter what place or what 
attitude your body is in, on your knees, or in the house of 
God, so long as your heart is not right, so long as you resist 
the Holy Ghost, and reject Christ, you are a rebel against 
your Maker. 

II. I am to show ivhat is a proper answer to this inquiry, 
"What must I do to be saved?" 

And, generally, you may give the sinner any direction, or 
tell him to do anything, that includes a right heart, and if 
you make him understand it, and do it, he will be saved. The 
Spirit of God, in striding "with sinners, suits his strivings to 
the state of mind in which he finds them. His great object 
in striving with them, is, to dislodge them from their hiding* 
places, and bring them to aubmit to God, at once* Now these 
objections, and difficulties, and states of mind, are as various 



348 DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 

as the circumstances of mankind, as many as there are in- 
dividuals. The characters of individuals afford an endless 
diversity. What is to be done with each one, and how he is 
to be converted, depend? on his particular errors. It is ne- 
cessary to ascertain his errors, to find out what he understands, 
and what he needs to be taught more perfectly, to see what 
points the Spirit of God is pressing upon his conscience, 
and to press the same things and thus bring him to Christ. 
The most common directions are the following : 

1. It is generally in point, and a safe and suitable direction 
! to tell a sinner to repent. I say, generally. For sometimes 
the Spirit of God seems not so much to direct the sinner's 
attention to his own sins as to some other thing. In the days 
of the apostles, the minds of the people seem to have been 
agitated mainly on the question, whether Jesus was the true 
Messiah. And so the apostles directed much of their instruc- 
tions to this point, to prove that he was -the Christ. And 
whenever anxious sinners asked them what they must do, 
they most commonly exhorted them to " Believe in the Lord 
Jesus Christ." They bore down on this point, because here 
was where the Spirit of God was striving with them, and 
this was the subject that especially agitated people's minds, 
and, consequently, this would probably be the first thing a 
person would do on submitting to God. It was the grand 
point at issue between God and the Jew and Gentile of those 
days, whether Jesus Christ was the son of God. It was the 
point in dispute. To bring a sinner to yield this controverted 
question, was the way the most effectually to humble him. 

At other times, it will be found, that the Spirit of God is 
dealing with sinners chiefly in reference to their own sins. 
Sometimes he deals with them in regard to a particular duty, 
as prayer, perhaps family prayer. The sinner will be found 
to be contesting that point with God, whether it is right for 
him to pray, or whether he ought to pray in his family. I 
have known striking cases of this kind, where the individual 
was struggling on this point, and as soon as he fell on his 
knees to pray, he yielded his heart, showing that this was the 
very point which the Spirit of God was contesting, and the 
hinge on which his controversy with God all turned. That 
was conversion. 

The direction to repent is always proper, but will not al- 
ways be effectual, for there may be some other thing that the 
sinner needs to be told also. And where it is the pertinent 
direction, sinners need not only to be told to repent, but to 
have it explained to them what repentance is. Since there 



DIRECTIONS TO SINKERS. 349 

has been so much mysticism, and false philosophy and false 
theology, thrown around the subject, it has become necessary 
to tell sinners not only what you mean by repentance, but 
also to tell them what you do not mean. Words that used to 
be plain and easily understood have now become so perverted 
that they need to be explained to sinners, or they will often 
convey a wrong impression to their minds. This is the case 
with the word repentance. Many suppose that remorse, or a 
sense of guilt, is repentance. Then hell is full of repentance, 
for it is full of remorse, unutterable and eternal. Others feel 
regret that they have done such a thing, and they call that 
repenting of it. But they only regret that they have sinned, 
because of the consequences, and not because they abhor sin. 
This is not repentance. Others suppose that convictions of 
sin and strong fears of hell are repentance. Others consider 
the remonstrances of conscience as repentance ; they say, " I 
never do anything wrong but that I repent ; that I always 
feel sorry I did it." Others regard repentance as a feeling of 
sorrow for sin. But repentance is not an involuntary feeling 
ofany kind or degree. Sinners must be shown that all these 
things are not repentance. They are not only consistent with 
the utmost wickedness, but the devil might have them all, and 
doubtless has them all, and yet remains a devil. Repentance 
is a* change of mind, as regards God and toward sin itself. It 
is not only a change of views, but a change of the ultimate 
_ reference or choice of the soul. It is a voluntary change, 
and by consequence involves a change of feeling and of action 
toward God and toward sin. It is what is naturally understood 
by "a change of mind on any subject of interest and impor- 
tance. "We hear that such a man has changed his mind on 
the subject of Abolition, for instance, or that he has changed 
his views in politics. Everybody understands that he has un- 
dergone a change in his views, his feelings, and his conduct 
This is repentance, on that subject, it is a change of mind, 
but not towards God. Evangelical repentance is a change of 
willing, of feeling, and of life, in respect to God. 

Repentance always implies abhorrence of sin. It is willing 
and feeling as God does in respect to sin. It of course in- 
volves the love of God, arfd an abhorrence of sin. It al- 
ways implies forsaking sin. Sinners should be made to un- 
derstand this. The sinner that repents does not feel as im- 
penitent sinners think they should feel, at giving up their 
sins if they should become religious. Impenitent sinners 
look upon religion just like this, that if they become pious, 
they shall be obliged to stay, away from balls and parties, and 



350 DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 

obliged to give up theatres, or gambling, or other things that 
they now take delight in. And they see not how they could 
ever enjoy themselves, if they should break off from all those 
things. But this is very far from being a correct view of the 
matter. Eeligion does not make them unhappy, by shutting 
them out from things in which they delight, because the first 
step in it is to repent, to change their mind in regard to all 
these things. They do not seem to realize that the person 
who has repented has no disposition for these things, he 
has given them up, and turned his mind away from them. 
Sinners feel as if they should want to go to such places, and 
want to mingle in such scenes, just as much as they do now, 
and that it will be such a continued sacrifice as to make them 
unhappy. This is a great mistake. 

I know there are some professors who would be very glad 
to betake themselves to their former practices, were it not 
that they feel constrained, by fear of losing their character, 
or the like. Now, mark me. If they feel so, it is because 
they have no religion, they do not hate sin. If they desire 
their former ways, they have no religion, they have never re- 
pented, for repentance always consists in a change of choice 
of views and feelings. If they were really converted, instead 
of choosing such things, they would turn away from them 
with loathing. Instead of lusting after the flesh-pots of 
Egypt, and desiring to go into their former circles, parties, 
balls, and the like, they find their highest pleasure in obeying 
God. 

2. Sinners should be told to believe the Gospel. Here, also, 
they need to have it explainedlo them, and to be told what 
is not faith, and what is. Nothing is more common than for 
a sinner, when told to believe the Gospel, to say, " I do be- 
lieve it." The fact is, he has been brought up to admit the 
fact, that the Gospel is true, but he does not believe it, he 
knows nothing about the evidence of it, and all his faith is a 
mere admission without evidence. He holds it to be true, in 
a kind of loose, indefinite sense, so that he is always ready to 
say, "I do believe the Bible." It is strange they do not see 
that they are deceived in thinking that they believe, for they 
must see that they have never acted upon these truths, as 
they do upon those things that they do believe. Yet it is 
often quite difficult to convince them that they do not 
believe. 

But the fact is, that the careless sinner does not believe 
the Gospel at all. The idea that the careless sinner is an 
intellectual believer is absurd. The devil is an intellectual be- 



DIRECTIONS TO SINNEIIS. 351 

liever, and that is what makes him tremble. What makes a 
sinner anxious is, that he begins to be an intellectual be- 
liever, and that makes him feel. No being in heaven, earth, or 
hell, can intellectually believe the truths of the Gospel, and 
not feel on the subject. The anxious sinner has faith of the 
same kind with devils, but he has not so much of it, and, 
therefore, he does not feel so much. The man that does not 
feel nor act at all, on the subject of religion is an infidel, let 
his professions be what they may. He that feels nothing, 
and does nothing, believes nothing. This is a philosophical 
fact. 

Faith does not consist in an intellectual conviction that 
Christ died for you in particular, nor in a belief that you are 
a Christian, or that you ever shall be, or that your sins are 
forgiven. But faith is that trust or confidence in God, and 
in Christ, that commits the whole soul to him in all his rela- 
tions to us. It is a voluntary trust in his person, his veracity, 
his word. This was the faith of Abraham. He had that 
confidence in what God said, which led him to act as if it were 
true. This is the way the apostle illustrates it in the eleventh 
of Hebrews. "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, 
the evidence of things not seen." And he goes on to illus- 
trate it by various examples. " Through faith we understand 
that the worlds were made," that is, we believe this, and act 
" accordingly. Take the case of Noah. Noah was warned of 
God of things not seen as yet, that is, he was assured that 
God was going to drown the world, and he believed it, and 
acted accordingly ; he prepared an ark to save his family, and 
by so doing, he condemned the world that would not believe ; 
his actions gave evidence that he was sincere. Abraham, too, 
was called of God to leave his country, with the promise that 
he should be the gainer by it, and he obeyed and went out, 
without knowing where he should go. Read the whole chap- 
ter and you will find many instances of the same kind. The 
whole design of the chapter is to illustrate the nature of faith, 
and to show that it invariably results in action. The sinner 
should have it explained to him, and be made to see that the 
faith which the Gospel requires is just that confidence in 
Christ which leads him to act on what he says as a certain 
fact. This is believing in Christ. 

3. Another direction proper to be given to the sinner is that 
he should give his heart to God. God says, " My son, give me 
thine heart." But here also there needs to be explanation, 
to make him understand what it is. It is amazing that there 
should be any darkness here. It is the language of common 



352 DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 

life, in everybody's mouth, and everybody understands just 
what it means, when we use it in regard to anything else. 
But when it comes to religion, they seem to be all in the dark. 
Ask a sinner, no matter what may be his age, or education, 
what it means to give the heart to God, and, strange as it 
may appear, he is at a loss for an answer. Ask a woman what 
it is to give her heart to her husband, or a man what it is to give 
his heart to his wife, and they understand it. But then they 
are totally blind as to giving their hearts to God. I suppose 
I have asked more than a thousand anxious sinners this ques- 
tion. When I have told them they must give their hearts to 
God, they would always say they were willing to do it, and, 
sometimes, that they were anxious to do it, and even seem to 
be in an agony of desire about it. Then I have asked them 
what they understood to be giving their hearts to God, as 
they were so willing to do it. And very seldom have I re- 
ceived a correct or rational answer from a sinner of any age. 
I have sometimes had the strangest answers that can be 
imagined — anything but what they ought to say. Now, to 
give your heart to God is the same thing as to give your heart 
to anybody else ; the same as for a woman to give her heart 
to her husband. Ask that woman if she understands this ? 
"Oh, yes, that is plain enough, it is to place my affections on 
him, and strive to please him in everything." Very well, place j 
your affections on God, and strive to please him in everything. 
Eat alas, when they come to the subject of religion, people ■ 
suppose there is some wonderful mystery about it. Some 
talk as if they supposed it was to take this bundle of muscles, 
or fleshy organ, in their bosom, and give it to God. Sinner, 
what God asks of you is, that you should love him supremely._ 

3. Submit to God, is also a proper direction to anxious sin- 
ners. And, oh, how dark sinners are here too. Scarcely a 
sinner can be found, who will not tell you he is willing to sub- 
mit to God. But they do not understand it. They need to 
be told what true submission is. Sometimes they think it 
means that they should be willing to be damned. Some- 
times they place themselves in this attitude, and call it sub- 
mission ; they say, if they are elected, they shall be saved, 
and if not, they shall be damned. This is not submission. 
True submission, is yielding obedience to God. Suppose a 
rebel, in arms against the government, was called on to sub- 
mit. "What would he understand by it? "Why, that he 
should yield the point, and lay down his arms, and obey the 
laws. That is just what it means, for a sinner to submit to 
God. He must cease his strife and conflict against his Maker, 



DIRECTIONS TO SINKER*. 353 

and take the attitude of a willing and obedient child, willing 
to be and do whatever God requires. " Here, Lord, am I ; 
Lord, what wilt thou have me to do ?" . 

Suppose a company of soldiers had rebelled, and Govern- 
ment had raised an army to put them down, and had driven 
them into a strong hold, where they were out of provisions, 
and had no way to escape, and they should not know what 
to do. Suppose the rebels to have met in this extremity, to 
consider what is to be done ? and one rises up, and says, 
" Well, comrades, I am convinced we are all wrong from the 
beginning, and now the reward of our deeds is like to over- 
take us, and we cannot escape, and as for remaining here to 
die, I am resolved not to do it, I am going to throw myself 
on the mercy of the commander-in-chief." That man submits. 
He ceases, from that moment, to be a rebel in his heart, just 
as soon as he comes to this conclusion. So it is with the sin- 
ner when he yields the point, and consents in his heart to do, 
and be, whatever God shall require. The sinner may be in 
doubt what to do, and may feel afraid to put himself in God's 
hands, thinking that if he does, perhaps God will send him 
down to hell, as he deserves. But it is his business to leave 
all that question with God, and not resist his Maker any 
longer, but give all up to God, make no conditions, and trust 

• it wholly to God's benevolence and wisdom to decide what 
shall be done, and to appoint his future condition. Until you 
do this, sinner, you have done nothing to the purpose. 

5. Another proper direction to be given to sinners, is to 
confess and forsake your sins. This means that they should 
both confess and forsake them. They must confess to God 
then* sins against God, and confess to men their sins against 
men, and forsake them all. A man does not forsake his sins 
till he has made all the reparation in his power. If he has 

f stolen money, or defrauded his neighbor out of property, he 
does not forsake his sins by merely resolving not to steal any 
more, or not to cheat again ; he must make reparation to the 
extent of his power. So, if he has slandered any one, he 
does not forsake his sin by merely saying he will not do so 
again. He must make reparation. So, in like manner, if he 
has robbed God, as all shiners have, he must make reparation, 
as far as he has the power. Suppose a man has made money 
in rebellion against God, and has withheld from him his 
time, talents and service, has lived and rioted upon the boun- 
ties of his providence, and refused to lay himself out for the 
salvation of the world ; he has robbed God. Now, if he 
should die feeling that this money was his own, and should he 



354 DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 

leave it to his heirs without consulting the will of God — why, 
he is just as certain to go to hell as the highway robber. He 
has never made any satisfaction to God. With all his whin- 
ing and pious talk, he has never confessed HIS SIN to God, 
nor forsaken his sin, for he has never felt nor acknowledged 
himself to be the steward of God. If he refuses to hold the 
property in his possession, as the steward of God : if he ac- 
counts it his own, and as such gives it to his children, he 
says, in effect, to God, " That property is not yours, it is 
mine, and I will give it to my children." He has continued 
to persevere in his sin, for he does not relinquish the ownership 
of that of which he has robbed God. 

What would a merchant think, if his hired clerk should 
take all the capital and set up a store of his own, and die 
with it in his hands ? Will such a man go to heaven ? " No," 
you say, every one of you, " If such a man does not go to 
hell, there might just as well be no hell." God would prove 
himself infinitely unjust, to let such a character go unpunished. 
What, then, shall we say of the man who has robbed God all 
his life ? Here God set him to be his clerk, to manage some 
of his affairs, and he has gone and stolen all the money, and 
says it is his, and he keeps it, and dies, and gives it to his 
children, as if it was all his own lawful property. Is that 
man going to heaven ? Has that man forsaken sin ? I tell 
you, no. If he has not surrendered himself and all to God,* 
he has not taken the first step in the way to heaven. 

6. Another proper direction to be given to sinners is, 
" Choose ye this day, whom ye will serve" Under the Old 
Testament dispensation, this or something equivalent to it, 
was the most common direction given. It was not common 
to call on men to believe in Christ until the days of John the 
Baptist He baptized those who came to him, with the bap- 
tism of repentance, and directed them to believe on him who 
should come after him. Under Joshua, the text was some- 
thing which the people all understood more easily than they 
would a call to believe on the distant Messiah ; it was " Choose 
ye, this day, whom ye will serve." On another occasion, 
Moses said to them, " I call heaven and earth to record this 
day against you, that I have set before you life and death, 
blessing and cursing : therefore choose life, that both thou 
and thy seed may live." The direction was accommodated to 
the people's knowledge. And it is good now, as it was then. 
Sinners are called upon to choose — what? Whether they 
will serve God or the world — whether they will follow holi- 
ness or sin. Let them be made to understand what is meant 



DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 355 

by choosing, and what it is to be chosen, and then if the 
thing is done from the heart, they will be saved. 

Any of these directions, if complied with, will constitute 
true conversion. The particular exercises may vary in differ- 
ent cases. Sometimes the first exercise in conversion, is sub- 
mission to God, sometimes repentance, sometimes faith, some- 
times the choice of God and his service, in short, whatever 
their thoughts are taken up with at the time. If their 
thoughts are directed to Christ at the moment, the first exer- 
cise will be faith. If to sin, the first exercise will be repent- 
ance. If to their future course of life, it is choosing the ser- 
vice of God. If to the Divine government, it is submission. 
It is important to find, out just where the Holy Spirit is press- 
ing the sinner at the time, and then take care to push that 
point. If it is in regard to Christ, press that ; if it is in re- 
gard to his future course of life, push him right up to an im- 
mediate choice of obedience to God. 

It is a great error to suppose that any one particular exer- 
cise is always foremost in conversion, or, that every sinner 
must have faith first, or submission first. It is not true, 
either in philosophy or in fact. There is a great variety in 
people's exercises. ; Whatever point is taken hold of, between 
God and the sinner, when the sinner YIELDS that, he is 
converted. *} Whatever the particular exercise may be, if it in- 
cludes obedience of heart to God on any point, it is true con- 
version. When he yields one jpoint to God's authority, he is 
ready to yield all. When he changes his mind, and obeys in 
one thing, because it is God's to ill, he will obey in other things, 
so far as he sees it to be God's wilL Where there is this right 
choice, then, whenever the mind is directed to any one point 
of duty, he is ready to follow. It matters very little which 
of these directions is given, if it is only made plain, and if it 
is to the point, so as to serve as a test of obedience to God, If 
it is to the point that the Spirit of God is debating with the 
sinner's mind, so as to fall in with the Spirit's work, and not 
to divert the sinner's attention from the very point in contro- 
versy, let it be made perfectly clear, and then pressed till the 
sinner yields, and he will be saved 

m. I am to mention several errors which anxious sinners 
are apt to fall into, respecting this great inquiry. 

1. The first error is, in supposing that they must make 
themselves better, or prepare themselves, so as in some way 
to recommend themselves to the mercy of God. It is mar- 
velous, that sinners will not understand, that all they have to 
do is to accept salvation from God, all prepared to their 



356 DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 

hands. But they all, learned or unlearned, at first, betake 
themselves to a legal course to get relief. This is one princi- 
pal reason why they will not become Christians at once, just 
as soon as they begin to attend to the subject. They imagine 
that they must be, in some way or other, prepared to come. 
They must change their dress, and make themselves look a 
little better ; they are not willing to come just as they are, in 
their rags and poverty. They must have something more 
on, before they can approach to God. They should be 
shown, at once, that it is impossible they should be any bet- 
ter, until they do what God requires. Every pulse that 
beats, every breath they draw, they are growing worse, be- 
cause they are standing out in rebellion against God, so long 
as they do not do the very thing which God requires of them 
as the first thing to be done. 

2. Another error is, in supposing that they must suffer a 
considerable time under conviction, as a kind of punishment, be- 
fore they are ready properly to come to Christ. And so they 
will pray for conviction. And they think, that if they are 
ground down to the earth, with distress, for a sufficient time, 
then God will pity them, and be more ready to help them, 
when he sees them so very miserable. They should be made 
to understand clearly, that they are thus unhappy and miser- 
able, merely because they refuse to accept the relief which God 
offers. Take the case of the stubborn child, when his parent 
stands over him with the rod, and the child shudders and 
screams. Should that child imagine he is gaining anything 
by his agony ? His distress arises from his conviction, and 
shall he pray for more conviction ? Does that make him any 
better? Does his father pity him any more, because he 
stands out ? Who does not see that he is all the while grow- 
ing worse ? 

3. Sometimes sinners imagine that they must wait for different 
feelings, before they submit to God. They say, " I do not 

think I feel right yet, to accept of Christ ; I do not think I 
am prepared to be converted yet." They ought to be made 
to see that what God requires of them is to will right. If 
they obey and submit with the willy the feelings will adjust 
themselves in due time. It is not a question of feeling, but 
of willing and acting. 

The feelings are involuntary, and have no moral character 
except what they derive from their action of the will, with 
which action they sympathize. Before the will is right, the 
feelings will not be, of course. The sinner should come to 
Christ by accepting him at once ; and this he must do, not 



DIRECTIONS TO SIXNEES. 35 7 

in obedience to his feelings, but in obedience to his conscience. 
Obey, submit, trust. Give up all instantly, and your feelings 
will come right. Do not wait for better feelings, but commit 
your whole being to God at once, and this will soon result 
in the feelings for which you are waiting. "What God requires 
of you, is the present act of your own mind, in turning from 
sin to holiness, and from the service of Satan to the service 
of the living God. 

4. Another error of sinners, is to suppose they must wait 
till their hearis are changed. " What ?" say they, " am I to be- 
lieve in Christ before my heart is changed ? Do you mean 
that I am to repent before my heart is changed ? Now, the 
simple answer to all this is, that the change of heart is the 
very thing in question. God requires sinners to love him. 
That is to change their heart. God requires the sinner to 
believe the Gospel. That is to change his heart. God re- 
quires him to repent. That is to change bis heart. God 
does not tell him to wait till his heart is changed, and then 
repent and believe, and love God. The very word itself, re- 
pent, signifies a change of mind or heart. To do either of 
these things, is to change your heart, and to make you a new 
heart, just as God requires. 

5. Sinners often get the idea that they are perfectly willing 
to do what God requires. Tell them to do this thing, or 
that, to repent, or believe, or give God their hearts, and they 
say, " Oh, yes, I am perfectly willing to do that, I wish I 
could do it, I would give anything if I could do it." They 
ought to understand, that, being truly willing is doing it, but 
there is a difference between willing and desiring. People 
often desire to be Christians, when they are wholly unwilling 
to be so. "When we see anything which appears to us to 
be a good, we are so constituted that we desire it. Y> T e 
necessarily desire it when it is before our minds. We can- 
not help desiring it in proportion as its goodness is presented 
to our minds. But yet we may not be willing to have it, 
under all the circumstances. It may be that we prefer, upon 
the whole, that the present possessor should continue to pos- 
sess it still. Or that we choose to have our friend or child 
possess it, instead of ourselves. A man may desire to go to 
Philadelphia on many accounts, while, for still more weighty 
reasons, he chooses not to go there. So the sinner may de- 
sire to be a Christian. He may see many good things in 
being a Christian. He may see that if he were a Christian 
he would be a great deal more happy, and that he should 
go to heaven when he dies, but yet he is not willing to be a 



358 DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 

Christian. WILLING to obey Christ is to be a Christian. 
"When an individual actually chooses to obey God, he is a 
Christian. But all such desires, as do not imply actual 
choice, are nothing. 

6. The sinner will sometimes say, that he offers to give 
God his heart, but he intimates that God is unwilling. But 
this is absurd. What does God ask ? Why, that you should 
love him. Now, for you to say you are willing to give God 
your heart, but God is unwilling, is the same as saying that 
you are willing to love God, but God is not willing to be 
loved by you, and will not suffer you to love him. It is im- 
portant to clear up all these points in the sinner's mind, that 
he may have no dark and mysterious corner to rest in, where 
the truth will not reach him. 

7. Sinners sometimes get the idea that they repent, when 
they are only convicted. Whenever the sinner is found 
resting in any LIE, let the truth sweep it away, however 
much it'may pain and distress him. If he has any error of 
this kind, you must tear it away from him, if you do not 
mean that he shall stumble into the depths of hell. 

8. Sinners are often wholly taken up with looking at them- 
selves, to see if they cannot find something there, some kind 
of feeling or other, that will recommend them to God. Evi- 
dently, for want of proper instruction, David Brainard was 
a long time taken up with his state of mind, looking for some 
feelings that would recommend him to God. Sometimes he 
imagined that he h^,d such feelings, and would tell God in 
prayer, that now he felt as he ought, to receive his mercy ; 
and then he would see that he had been all wrong, and be 
ashamed that he had told God that he felt right. Thus, the' 
poor man, for want of correct instruction, was driven almost 
to despair, and it is easy to see that his Christian exercises 
through life were greatly modified, and his comfort and use- 
fulness much impaired by the false philosophy he had adopted 
on this point. You must turn the sinner away from himself 
to something else. Suppose he keeps poring over himself, 
until he is going into a state of despair. The proper course 
then is, to turn off his attention from looking at himself, 
and make him look at some duty to be performed, or make 
him look at Christ, and, perhaps, before he is aware, he will 
find that he has submitted to God. His attention was di- 
verted away from himself, to contemplate the reasonableness 
of God's requirements, or the sufficiency of Christ's atone- 
ment, or something of this kind, and as he dwelt upon it, he 
just gave up his heart, and the agony was over. 



DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 359 



REMARKS. 

1. The labor of ministers is greatly increased, and the 
difficulties in the way of salvation are greatly multiplied, by 
the false instructions that have been given to sinners. The 
consequence has been, that directions which used to be plain 
are now obscure. People have been taught so long, that 
there is something awfully mysterious and unintelligible 
about conversion, that they do not try to understand it. 
Sinners have been taught these false notions, till now they 
are everywhere entrenched behind these sentiments, such as 
"cannot repent," "must wait for God," and the like. It 
was once sufficient, as we leam from the Bible, to tell sinners 
to repent, or to tell them to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. 
But now faith has been talked about as a prirwiple, instead 
of an act, and repentance as something put into the mind, 
instead of an exercise of the mind, and sinners are per- 
plexed. Ministers are charged with preaching heresy, be- 
cause they presume to teach that faith is an exercise, and not 
a principle, and that sin is an act, and not a part of the con- 
stitution of man. And sinners have become so sophisticated, 
that you have to be at great pains in explaining not only 
what you do not mean, but what you do mean, otherwise 
they will be almost sure to misunderstand you, and either 
gain a false relief from their anxiety, by throwing their duty 
off upon God, or else run into despair from the supposed im- 
practicability of doing what is requisite for their salvation. 
It is often the greatest difficulty to lead them out of these 
theological labyrinths and mazes, into which they have been 
deluded, and to lead them along the straight and simple way 
of the Gospel. It seems as if the greatest ingenuity had been 
employed to mystify the minds of people and weave a most 
subtle web of false philosophy, calculated to involve a sinner 
in endless darkness. 

Who that haslbeen in revivals, has not encountered that 
endless train of fooleries, which have been inculcated, till it 
has become necessary to be as plain as A B 0, and the best 
educated have to be talked to just like children. So much 
has been done to mystify and befool people's minds in the 
plainest matters. Tell a sinner to believe, and he turns round 
to you, and stares, " Why, how you talk ; is not faith a prin- 
ciple implanted in the soul, and how am I to believe until I 
get this principle ?" So, if a minister tells a sinner the very 
words that the apostles used, in the great revival at the day 
of pentecost, " Bepent and be converted, every one of you," 



360 DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 

they reply as they have been taught, " Oh, I guess you 
are an Arrrrinian ; I do not want any of your Arminian teach- 
ing for me ; do not you deny the Spirit's influences ?" It is 
enough to make humanity weep to see the fog and darkness 
that have been thrown around the plain directions of the 
Gospel, till many generations have been emptied into hell. 

2. These false instructions to sinners are infinitely worse 
than none. The Lord Jesus Christ found it more difficult to 
get the people to yield up their false notions of theology than 
anything else. This has been the great difficulty with the 
Jews to this day, that they have received false notions in 
theology, have perverted the truth on certain points, and you 
cannot make them understand the plainest points in the 
Gospel. So it is with sinners, the most difficult thing to be 
done is to get away these refuges of lies, which they have 
gotten from false theology. They are so fond of holding on 
to these refuges, because they are called orthodox, and be- 
cause they excuse the sinner, and condemn God, that it is 
found to be the most perplexing, and difficult, and discourag- 
ing part of a minister's labor to drive them away. 

3. No wonder the Gospel has taken so little effect, encum- 
bered as it has been with these strange dogmas. The truth 
is, that very little of the Gospel has come out upon the world, 
for these hundreds of years, without being clogged and ob- 
scured by false theology. People have been told that they 
must repent, and, in the same breath, told that they could 
not repent until the truth itself has been all mixed up with 
error, so as to produce the same practical effect with error, 
and the Gospel that is preached has been another gospel, or 
no gospel at all. 

4. You can understand what is meant by healing slightly 
the hurt of the daughter of God's people, and the danger of 
doing it. It is very easy when sinners are under conviction, 
to say something that shall smooth over the case, and relieve 
their anxiety, so that they will either get a false hope, or will 
be converted with their views so obscure, that they will al- 
ways be poor, feeble, wavering, doubting, inefficient Christians. 

5. Much depends on the manner in which a person is dealt 
with, when under conviction. Much of his future comfort 
and usefulness depends on the clearness, and strength, and 
firmness, with which the directions of the Gospel are given, 
when he is under conviction. If those who deal with him are 
afraid to use the probe thoroughly, he will always be a poor, 
sickly, doubting Christian. If converted at all, he will never 
do much good. The true mode, is to deal thoroughly and 



DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 361 

plainly with a sinner, to tear away every excuse he can get 
up, and show him plainly what he is, and what he ought to 
be, and he will bless God to all eternity, that he fell in with 
those who would be so faithful to his soul. For the want of 
this thorough and searching management, many are convert- 
ed who seem to be stillborn. And the reason is, they never 
were faithfully dealt with. We may charitably hope they are 
Christians, but still it is uncertain and doubtful Their con- 
version seems rather a change of opinion, than a change of 
heart. But if, when a sinner is under conviction, you pour in 
the truth, put in the probe, break up the old foundations, and 
sweep away his refuges of lies, and use the word of God, lite 
fire and like a hammer, you will find that they will come out 
with clear views, and strong faith, and firm principles, not 
doubting, halting, irresolute Christians, but such as follow the 
Lord wholly. That is the way to make strong Christians. 
This has been eminently the case in many revivals of modern 
days. I have heard old Christians say of the converts, " These 
converts were bom men and women, full grown, they never 
were children, but have, at the very outset, all the clearness 
of view, and strength of faith, of old Christians. They seem 
to understand the doctrines of religion, and to know what to 
do, and how to take hold, to promote revivals, better than 
one in a hundred of the old members in the church. " 

I once knew a young man who was converted, away from 
home. The place where he lived had no minister, and no 
preaching, and no religion. He went home in three days after 
he was converted, and immediately set himself to work, to la- 
bor for a revival He set up meetings in his neighborhood, 
and prayed and labored, and a revival broke out, of which he 
had the principal management through a powerful work, which 
converted most of the principal men of the place. The truth 
was, he had been so dealt with, that he knew what he was 
about. He understood the subject, and knew where he stood 
himself. He was not all the while troubled with doubts, 
whether he was himself a Christian. He knew that he was 
serving God, and that God was with him, and so he went 
boldly and resolutely forward to his object But if you un- 
dertake to make converts, without cutting up all their errors, 
and tearing away their false hopes, you may make a host of 
hypocrites, or of puny, dwarfish Christians, always doubting, 
and easily turned back from a revival spirit, and worth no- 
thing. The way is, to bring them right out to the light. 
When a man is converted in this way, you can depend on him, 
and know where to find him. 
16 



362 DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 

7. Protracted seasons of conviction are generally owing to 
defective instruction. Wherever clear and faithful instruc- 
tions are given to sinners, there you will generally find that 
convictions are deep and pungent, but short. 

8. "Where clear and discriminating instructions are given to 
convicted sinners, if they do not soon submit, their convic- 
tions will generally leave them. Convictions in such cases 
are generally short. Where sinners are deceived by false 
views, they may be kept along for weeks, and perhaps months, 
and sometimes for years, in a languishing state, and at last, 
perhaps, be crowded into the kingdom and saved. But where 
the truth is made perfectly clear to the sinner's mind, and all 
his errors are torn away, if he does not soon submit, his case is 
hopeless. Where the truth is brought to bear upon his mind, 
and he directly resists the very truth that must convert him, 
there is nothing more to be done. The Spirit will soon leave 
him, for the very weapons he uses are resisted. Where in- 
structions are not clear, and are mixed up with errors, the 
Spirit may strive even for years, in great mercy, to get sin- 
ners through the fog of false instruction. But not so, where 
their duty is clearly explained to them, and they are brought 
right up to the single point of immediate submission, and 
have all their false pretences exposed, and the path of duty 
made perfectly plain. Then, if they do not submit, the 
Spirit of God forsakes them, and their state is well nigh 
hopeless. 

If there be sinners in this house, and you see your duty 
clearly, TAKE CABE how you delay. If you do not sub- 
mit, you may expect the Spirit of God will forsake you, and 
you are LOST. 

8. A vast deal of the direction given to anxious sinners 
amounts to little less than the popish doctrine of indulgences. 
The pope used to sell indulgences to sin, and this led to the 
reformation under Luther. Sometimes people would purchase 
an indulgence to sin for a certain time, or to commit some 
particular sin, or a number of sins. Now, there is a vast deal 
in protestant churches, which is little less than the same thing. 
What does it differ from this, to tell a sinner to wait ? The 
amount of it is, telling him to continue in sin a while longer, 
while he is waiting for God to convert him. And what is that 
but an indulgence to commit sin ? Any direction given to 
sinners that does not require them immediately to obey God, 
is an indulgence to sin. It is in effect, giving them liberty to 
continue in sin against God. Such directions are not only 
wicked, but ruinous and cruel. If they do not destroy the 



DIRECTIONS TO SINNERS. 363 

soul, as no doubt they often do, they defer y at all events, the 
sinner's enjoyment of 6~od and of Christ, and he stands a 
great chance of being lost for ever, while listening to such in- 
structions. Oh, how dangerous it is, to give a sinner reason 
to think he may wait a moment, before giving his heart to 
God. 

9. So far as I have had opportunity to observe, those con- 
versions which are most sudden have commonly turned out 
to be the best Christians. I know the reverse of this has 
often been held and maintained. But I am satisfied there is 
no reason for it, although multitudes, even now, regard it as 
a suspicious circumstance, if a man has been converted very 
suddenly. But the Bible gives no warrant for this supposi- 
tion. There is not a case of protracted conviction recorded 
in the whole Bible. All the conversions recorded there, are 
sudden conversions. And I am persuaded there never would 
have been such multitudes of tedious convictions, and often 
ending in nothing after all, if it had not been for those theo- 
logical perversions which have filled the world with cannot-ism. 
In Bible days, they told sinners to repent, and they did it 
then. Cannot-ism had not been broached in that day. It is 
this speculation, about the inability of sinners to obey God, 
that lays the foundation for all the protracted anguish and 
distress, and perhaps ruin, through which so many are led. 
Where a sinner is brought to see what he has to do, and he 
takes his stand at once, AND DOES IT, he generally does so 
afterwards, and you generally find that such a person will 
hold out so, and prove a decided character. You will not find 
him one of those that you always have to ivarp up to duty, 
like a ship, against wind and tide. Look at those professors 
who always have to be dragged forward in duty, and you will 
generally find that they had not clear and consistent direc- 
tions when they were converted, and most likely they will be 
very much "afraid of these sudden conversions." 

Afraid of sudden conversions ! Some of the best Christians 
of my acquaintance were convicted and converted in the space 
of a few minutes. In one quarter of the time that I have 
been speaking, many of them were awakened, and came right 
out on the Lord's side, and have been shining lights in the 
church ever since, and nave generally manifested the same • 
decision of character in religion, that they did when they first 
came out and took a stand on the Lord s side. 



LECTUEE XIX. 



INSTRUCTIONS TO CONVERTS. 



Text.— Feed my lambs. — John xxi. 15. 



You, who read your Bibles, recollect the connection in which 
these words are found, and by whom they were spoken. They 
were addressed by the Lord Jesus Christ to Peter, after he 
had denied his Lord, and had professed repentance. Proba- 
bly one of the designs which Christ had in view, in suffering 
Peter to sin so awfully as to deny his master, was to produce 
a deeper work of grace in him, and thus fit him for the pecu- 
liar duty to which he intended to call him, in laying the foun- 
dations of the Christian Church, and watching over the 
spiritual interests of the converts. It needed a peculiar work 
of grace in his soul, to fit him to lead others through those 
scenes of trial and temptation to which the early Christians, 
in particular, were exposed. 

It is evident, that, though Peter had special natural qualifi- 
cations for such a work, yet he was quite a superficial saint. 
He was probably converted before this, but he was weak, and 
there was left so much of his natural roughness and turbu- 
lence of temper, that he was still ready to bristle up on any 
occasion, and take offence at everything that crossed him, so 
that he was still quite unfit for that particular work to which 
he was destined. Christ designed him for such a peculiar 
service, that it seems something was indispensable to fit him 
for it, and make him such a saint, that future opposition 
would not irritate him, nor difficulties dishearten him, nor 
success and honor spoil him, by lifting up his heart with pride. 
And, therefore, Christ takes the effectual method recorded 
before us, of dealing with him once for all, to secure a thor- 
ough work in his soul. 

He asked him this question, to remind him, in an affecting 
manner, at once of his sin and of the love of Christ, " Simon, 
son of Jona, lovest thou me more than these?" Strongly 
implying a doubt whether he did love him. Peter answers, 
" Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee." He said unto him, 
"Feed my lambs." He then repeated the question, as if he 
would read his inmost soul, " Simon, son of Jona, lovest thou 
(364) 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 365 

me ?" Peter was still firm, and promptly answers again, 
" Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee." Jesus still asked 
him the question again, the third time, emphatically. He 
seemed to urge the point, as if he would search his inmost 
thoughts, to see whether Peter would ever deny him again. 
Peter was touched, he was grieved, it is said ; he did not fly 
into a passion — he did not boast, as he did on a former oc- 
casion, " Though I should die with thee, yet would I not deny 
thee," but he was grieved, he was subdued, he spoke tenderly, 
he appealed to the Saviour himself, as if he would implore 
him not to doubt his sincerity any longer, " Lord, thou know- 
est all things, thou knowest that I love thee." Christ then 
gave him his final charge, " Feed my sheep." » 

By the terms sheep and lambs here, the Saviour undoubted- 
ly designated Christians — members of his church ; the lambs 
probably represent young converts, those that have but little 
experience and but little knowledge of religion, and therefore, 
need to have special attention and pains taken with them, to 
guard from harm, and to train them for future' usefulness. 
And when our Saviour told Peter to feed his sheep, he doubt- 
less referred to the important part which Peter was to perform 
in watching over the newly formed churches in different parts 
of the world, and in training the young converts, and leading 
them along to usefulness and happiness. 

My last lecture was on the subject of giving right instruc- 
tion to anxious sinners. And this naturally brings me along, 
in this Course of Lectures, to consider the manner in which 
young converts should be treated and the instructions that 
should be given to them. 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

In speaking on this subject, it is my design, 

L To state several things that ought to be considered, in 
regard to the hopes of young converts. 

II. Several things respecting their making a profession of 
religion, and joining the church. 

TTT- The importance of having correct instruction given to 
young converts. 

IV. What should not be taught to young converts. 

V. What particular things are specially necessary to be 
taught to young converts. 

VI. How young converts should be treated by church mem- 
bers. 



366 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

I. I am to state several matters in regard to the hopes of 
young converts. 

1. Nothing should be said to them to create a hope. No- 
thing should ordinarily be intimated to persons under con- 
viction, calculated to make them think they have experienced 
religion, till they find it out themselves. I do not like this 
term, " experienced religion/' and I use it only because it is a 
phrase in common use. It is an absurdity in itself. What 
is religion ? Obedience to God. Suppose you should hear a 
good citizen say he had experienced obedience to the govern- 
ment of the country. Tou see it is nonsense. Or suppose a 
child should talk about experiencing obedience to his father. 
If he kney what he was saying, he would say he had obeyed 
his father, just as the apostle Paul says to the Eoman believers, 
" Ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which 
was delivered you." 

What I mean to say is, that ordinarily, it is best to let their 
hope or belief that they are converted spring up spontaneous- 
ly in their own minds. Sometimes it will happen that per- 
sons may be really converted, but owing to some notions 
which they have been taught about religion, they do not re- 
alize it. Their views of what religion is, and its effect upon 
the mind, are so entirely wide of the truth, that they do not 
think that they have it. I will give you an illustration of this 
point. 

Some years since, I labored in a place where a revival was 
in progress, and there was in the place a young lady from Bos- 
ton. She had been brought up a Unitarian, she had consider- 
able education, and was intelligent on many subjects, but on 
the subject of religion she was very ignorant. At length she 
was convicted of sin. She became awfully convinced of her 
horrible enmity against God. She had been so educated as to 
have a sense of propriety, but her enmity against God became 
so great, and broke out so frightfully, that it was horrible to 
hear her talk. She used to come to the anxious meetings, 
where we conversed with each one separately. And her feel- 
ings of opposition to God were such that she used to create 
disturbance. By the time I came within two or three seats 
from her, where she could hear what I said in a low voice to 
others, she would begin to make remarks in reply, so that 
they could be heard. And she would say the most bit- 
ter things against God, and against his providence, and his 
method of dealing with mankind, as if God was an infinite 
tyrant. She would speak of him as the most unjust and 
cruel being in the universe. I w T ould try to hush her, and 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 367 

make her keep still, because she distracted the attention of 
others. Sometimes she would stop and command her temper 
awhile, and sometimes she would rise and go out. I have sel- 
dom seen a case, where the enmity of the heart rose so high 
against God. One night at the anxious meeting, after she 
had been very restless, as I came towards her, she began as 
usual to reply, but I hushed her, and told her I could not 
converse with her there, but invited her to my room the next 
morning, and then I would talk with her. She promised to 
come, but, says she, " God is unjust, he is in finitely unjust. 
Is he not almighty ? Why then has he never shown me my 
enmity before? Why has he let me ran on so long? Why 
does he let my friends at Boston remain in this ignorance ? 
They are the enemies of God, as much as I am, and are go- 
ing to hell. Why does he not show them the truth in regard 
to their condition ?" And in this temper she left the room. 

The next morning she came to my room, as she had prom- 
ised. I saw as soon as she came in that her countenance was 
changed, but I said nothing about it. "Oh," said she, "I 
have changed my mind, as to what I said last night about 
God, I do not think he has done me any wrong, and I think 
I shall get religion sometime, for now I love to think about 
God. I have been all wrong ; the reason why I had never 
known my enmity before, was, that I would not. I used to 
read the Bible, but I always passed over the passages that 
would make me feel as if I was a lost sinner, and those pas- 
sages that spoke of Jesus Christ as God, I passed over with- 
out consideration, and now I see that it was my fault, not 
God's fault, that I did not know any more about myself ; I 
have changed my mind now." She had no idea that this was 
religion, but she was encouraged now to expect religion at 
some future time, because she loved God so much. I said 
nothing to make her imagine that I thought her a Christian, 
but left her to find it out. And, for a time, her mind was so 
entirely occupied with thinking about God, that she never 
seemed to ask whether this is religion or not. 

It is a great evil, ordinarily, to encourage persons to hope 
they are Christians. Very likely you may judge prematurely. 
Or if not, it is better they should find it out for themselves, 
suppose they do not see it at once. They may break down 
lower than ever, and then they will come out so clear and de- 
cided, that they will know where they are. 

2. When you see persons expressing a hope, and yet they 
express doubts too, it is generally because the work is not 
thorough. If they arfc converted, they need breaking up. 



368 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

They are still lingering around the world, or they have not 
broken off effectually from their sins, and they need to be 
pushed back, rather than urged forward. If you see reason 
to doubt, or if you find that they have doubts, most proba- 
bly there is some good reason to doubt. Sometimes persons 
express a hope in Christ, and afterwards remember some sin, 
that needs to be confessed to men, or some case where they 
have slandered, or defrauded, where it is necessary to make 
satisfaction, and where either their character, or their purse, 
is so deeply implicated that they hesitate, and refuse to per- 
form their duty. This grieves the Spirit, brings darkness 
over their minds of course, and justly leads them to doubt 
whether they are truly converted. If a soul is truly convert- 
ed, it will generally be found when there are doubts, that on 
some point they are neglecting duty. They should be searched 
as with a lighted candle, and brought up to the performance of 
duty, and not suffered to hope until they do it. Ordinarily it 
is proper just there to throw in some plain and searching 
truth, that will go through them, something that will wither 
their hopes like a moth. Do it while the Spirit of God is 
dealing with them, and do it in the right way, and there is no 
danger of its doing harm. 

To illustrate this : I knew a person, who was a member of 
the church, but an abominable hypocrite, proved to be so by 
her conduct, and afterwards fully confessed to be so. In a 
revival of religion she was awakened and deeply convicted, 
and after a while she got a hope. She came to a minister to 
talk with him about her hope, and he poured in the truth to 
her mind in such a manner as to annihilate all her hopes. 
She then remained under conviction many days, and at last 
she broke out in hope again. The minister knew her temper- 
ament, and knew what she needed, and he tore away her hope 
again. And then she broke down, clear to the ground, so 
that she could not stand or go. So deeply did the Spirit of 
God PKOBE her heart, that, for a time, it took away all her 
bodily strength. And then she came out subdued. Before, 
she had been one of the proudest rebels against God's gov- 
ernment that ever was, but now she became humbled, and 
was one of the most modest, tender, lovely of Christians. No 
doubt that was just the way to deal with her. It was just 
the treatment that her case required. 

It is often useful to deal with individuals in this way. Some 
persons are naturally unamiable in their temper,, and unlovely 
in their deportment. And it is particularly important that 
such persons should be dealt with most thoroughly whenever 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 369 

they first begin to express hope in Christ. Unless the work 
with them, is, in the first place, uncommonly deep and thor- 
ough, they will be vastly less useful, and interesting, and 
happy, than they would have been, had the probe been thor- 
oughly and skilfully applied to their hearts. If they are 
encouraged at first, without being thoroughly dealt with, if 
they are left to go right along, and not sufficiently probed 
and broken down, these unlovely traits of character will remain 
unsubdued, and will be always breaking out to the great in- 
jury, both of their personal peace, and their general influence 
and usefulness as Christians. 

It is important to take advantage of such characters while 
they are just in these peculiar circumstances, so that they can 
be moulded into proper form. Do not spare, though it should 
be a child, or a brother, or a husband, or a wife. Let it be 
a thorough work. If they express a hope, and you find they 
bear the image of Christ, they are Christians. But if that 
appears doubtful — if they do not appear to be fully changed, 
just tear away their hope, by searching them with the most 
discriminating truth, and leave the Spirit to do the work more 
deeply. If still the image is not perfect, do it again — break 
them down into a child-like spirit, and then let them hope. 
They will then be clear and thorough Christians. By such a 
mode of treatment, I have often known people of the crook- 
edest and hatefulest natural character, so transformed in a 
few days, that they appear like different beings. You would 
think the work of a whole life of Christian cultivation had 
been done at once. Doubtless this was the intent of our 
Saviour's dealing with Peter. He had been converted, but 
became puffed up with spiritual pride and self-confidence, 
and then he fell. After that, Christ broke him down again, 
by three times searching him with the inquiry, " Simon, son 
of Jona, lovest thou me ?" after which, he seems to have been 
a stable and devoted saint the rest of his days. 

3. There is no need of young converts having or expressing 
doubts as to their conversion. There is no more need of a per- 
son doubting whether he is now in favor of God's govern- 
ment, than there is for a man to doubt whether he is in favor 
of our government or another. It is, in fact, on the face of 
it, absurd, for a person to talk of doubting on such a point, 
if he is intelligent and understands what he is talking about. 
It has long been supposed to be a virtue, and a mark of 
humility, for a person to doubt whether he is a Christian, and 
this notion that there is virtue in doubting is a device of the 
devil. "I say, neighbor, are you in favor of our government, 
IS* 



370 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

or do you prefer that of Eussia ?" " Why, I have some hopes 
that I love our own government, but I have many doubts." 
"Wonderful ! "Woman, do you love your children ?" " Why, 
sir, I sometimes have a trembling hope that I love them, but 
you know the best have doubts." " Wife, do you love your 
husband ?" " I do not know — I sometimes think I do, but 
you know the heart is deceitful, and we ought to be careful 
and not be too confident." Who would have such a wife? 
" Man do you love your wife, do you love your family Y* "Ah, 
you know we are poor creatures, we do not know our own 
hearts. I think I do love them, but perhaps I am deceived." 
Ridiculous ! 

Ordinarily, the very idea of a person's expressing doubts, 
renders his piety truly doubtful, A real Christian has no 
need to doubt. And when one is full of doubts, ordinarily 
you opght to doubt for him and help him doubt. Affection 
to God is as much a matter of consciousness as any other af- 
fection. A woman knows she loves her child. How ? By 
consciousness. She is conscious of the exercise of this affec- 
tion. And, then, she sees it carried out into action every day. 
In the same way a Christian may know that he loves God, by 
his consciousness of this affection, and by seeing that it in- 
fluences his daily conduct. 

In the case of young converts, truly such, these doubts 
generally arise from their having been wrongly dealt with, 
and not sufficiently taught, or not thoroughly humbled. In 
any case, they should never be left in such a state, but should 
be brought, if possible, to such a thorough change, that they 
will doubt no longer. It is inconsistent with the greatest 
usefulness, for a Christian to be always entertaining doubts. 
It not only makes him gloomy, but it renders his religion a 
stumbling block to sinners. What do sinners think of such 
religion ? They say, " These converts are always afraid to 
think they have got any thing real. They are always trem- 
bling, and doubting whether it is a reality, and they ought to 
know whether there is anything in it or not ; for if it is any- 
thing, these people seem to have it, and I am inclined to think 
it rather doubtful. At any rate, I will let it pass for the pre- 
sent ; for I do not believe God will damn me for not attending 
to what appears so uncertain. " No, a cheerful, settled hope in 
Christ, is indispensable to usefulness, and therefore you should 
deal so with young converts, as to lead them to a consistent, 
well-grounded, stable hope. Ordinarily this may be done, if 
pursued wisely, at the proper time, and that is at the com- 
mencement of their religious life. And they should not be 
left till it is done. 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 371 

I know there are some exceptions ; there are cases where 
the best instructions will be ineffectual, but these generally 
depend on the state of the health, and the condition of the 
nervous system. Sometimes you find a person incapable of 
reasoning on a certain topic, and so their errors will not yield 
to instruction. But most commonly they mistake the state 
of their own hearts, because they judge under the influence 
of a physical disease. Sometimes persons under a nervous 
depression will go almost into despair. I will not take time 
now to show the connection, but persons who are acquainted 
with physiology will easily explain the matter, and this will 
make it plain that the only way to deal with such cases is 
first to recruit their health, and get their nervous system in a 
proper tone, and thus remove the physical cause of their 
gloom and depression, and then they will be able to receive 
and apply your instructions to the state of their minds. But 
if you cannot remove their gloom and doubts and fears in this 
way, you can at least avoid doing any positive harm, by giv- 
ing them wrong instructions. I have known even experi- 
enced Christians to have the error fastened upon them, 
thinking it was necessary, or was virtuous, or a mark of humili- 
ty to be always in doubt, and Satan would take advantage of 
it, and of the state of their health, to drive them almost into 
despair. You ought to guard against this, by avoiding the 
error in teaching young converts. Teach them that instead 
of there being any virtue in doubting, it is a sin to have any 
reason to doubt, and a sin if they doubt without any reason, 
and a sin to be gloomy, and disgust sinners with their des- 
pondency. And if you teach them thoroughly what religion 
is, and make them SEE CLEARLY what God wishes to have 
them do, and lead them to do it promptly and decidedly, ordi- 
narily they will not be harassed with doubts and fears, but 
will be clear, open-hearted, cheerful and growing Christians, an 
honor to the religion they profess, and a blessing to the church 
and the world. 

II. I proceed to mention some things worthy of considera- 
tion in regard to their making a profession of religion, or 
joining the church. 

1. Young converts should, ordinarily, offer themselves for 
admission to some church of Christ immediately. By immedi- 
ately, I mean that they should do it the first opportunity 
they have. They should not wait. If they set out in re* 
ligion by waiting, most likely they will always be waiting, 
and never do anything to much purpose. If they are 
taught to wait under conviction, before they give them- 



372 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

selves up to Christ, or if they are taught to wait after 
conversion, before they give themselves publicly to God, by 
joining the church, they will probably go halting and stum- 
bling along through life. The first thing they should be taught, 
always is, Never to wait where God has pointed out your 
duty. "We profess to have given up the waiting system, let 
us carry it through and be consistent. 

While I say it is the duty of young converts to offer them- 
selves to the church immediately, I do not say that they 
should, in all cases, be received immediately. But the church 
may, and have an undoubted right to assume the responsibil- 
ity of receiving them immediately or not. If the church are 
not satisfied in the case, they have the power to bid candi- 
dates wait till they can make inquiries, or in any other way 
obtain satisfaction, as to their character and their sincerity. 
This is more necessary in large cities than it is in the country, 
because the church is liable to receive so many applications 
from persons that are entire strangers, where it is necessary 
to make inquiries before admitting them to communion. But 
if the church think it necessary to postpone an applicant, the 
responsibility is not his. He has not postponed obedience to 
the dying command of Christ, and so he has not grieved the 
Spirit away, and so he may not be essentially injured if he is 
faithful in other respects. Whereas, if he had neglected the 
duty voluntarily, he would soon get into the dark, and very 
likely backslide. 

If there is no particular reason for delay, ordinarily the 
church ought to receive them when they apply. If they are 
sufficiently instructed on the subject of religion to know what 
they are doing, and if their general character is such that 
they can be trusted as to their sincerity and honesty in mak- 
ing a profession, I see no reason why they should delay. But 
if there are sufficient reasons, in view of the church, for mak- 
ing them wait a reasonable time, let them do it, on their re- 
sponsibility to Jesus Christ. They should, however, remem- 
ber, what is the responsibility they assume, and that if they 
keep those out of the church who ought to be in it, they sin, 
and grieve the Holy Spirit. 

It is impossible to lay down particular rules on this subject, 
applicable to all cases. There is so great a variety of reasons 
which may warrant keeping persons back, that no general 
rules can re$ch them all. Our practice, in this church, is to 
propound persons for a month after they make application, 
before they are received to fiall communion. The reason of 
this is, that the Session may have opportunity to inquire re- 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 373 

specting individuals who offer themselves, as so many of them 
are strangers. But in the country, where there are regular 
congregations, and all the people have been instructed from 
their youth in the doctrines of religion, and where everybody 
is perfectly known, the case is different, and ordinarily I see 
no reason why persons of fair character should not be admit- 
ted immediately. If a person has not been a drunkard, or 
otherwise of bad character, let him be admitted at once, as 
soon as he can give a rational and satisfactory account of the 
hope that is in him. 

That is evidently the way the apostles did. There is not 
the least evidence in the New Testament, that they ever put 
off a person that wanted to be baptized and join the church. 
I know this does not satisfy some people, because they think 
the case is different. But I do not see it so. They say the 
apostles were inspired. That is true ; btit it does not follow 
that they were inspired to read the characters of men, so as to 
prevent their making mistakes in this matter. On the other 
hand, we know they were not inspired in this way, for we know 
they did make mistakes, just as ministers may do now, and, 
therefore, it is not true that their being inspired men alters 
the case on this point. Simon Magus was supposed to be 
a Christian, and was baptised and admitted to the commu- 
nion, and remained in good standing till he undertook to pur- 
chase the Holy Ghost with money. The apostles used to admit 
converts from Heathenism immediately, and without delay. 
If they could receive persons who, perhaps, never heard more 
than one Gospel sermon, and who never had a Bible, nor at- 
tended a Sabbath-school or Bible-class in their lives, surely it ■ 
is not necessary to wake up such an outcry and alarm, if a 
church thinks proper to receive persons of fair character who 
have had the Bible all their lives, and been trained in the 
Sabbath-school, and sat under the preaching of the Gospel, 
and who, therefore, may be supposed to understand what they 
are about, and not to profess what they do not feel. 

I know it may be said that persons who make a profession 
of religion now, are not obliged to make such sacrifices for 
their religion as the early believers were, and, consequently, 
people may be more ready to play the hypocrite. And, to 
some extent, that is true. But then, on the other hand, it 
should be remembered, that, with the instructions which they 
have on the subject of religion, they are not so easily led to 
deceive themselves, as those who were converted without the 
previous advantages of a religious education. They may be 
strongly tempted to deceive others, but I insist upon it, that, 



374 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

with the instructions which they have received, the converts 
of these great revivals are not half so liable to deceive them- 
selves, and take up with a false hope, as they were in the days 
of the apostles. And on this ground I believe that those 
churches who are faithful in dealing with young converts, and 
who exhibit habitually the power of religion, are not likely to 
receive so many unconverted persons, as the apostles did. 

It is important that the churches should act wisely on this 
point. Great evil has been done by this practice of keeping 
persons out of the church a long time to see if they were 
Christians. This is almost as absurd as it would be to throw 
out a young child into the street, to see whether it will live ; 
to say, if it lives and promises to be a healthy child, we will 
take care of it, when that is the very time it wants nursing, 
and taking care of, at the moment when the scale is turning, 
whether it shall live or die. Is that the way to deal with 
young converts? Should the church throw her new-born 
children out to the winds, and say, if they live there, let them 
be raised ; but if they die, they ought to die. I have not a 
doubt that thousands of converts, in consequence of this treat- 
ment, have gone through life, and never have joined any 
church, but have lingered along, full of doubts, and fears, and 
darkness, and in this way have spent their days, and gone to 
the grave without the comforts or the usefulness which they 
might have enjoyed, simply because the church, in her folly, 
has suffered them to wait outside of the pale, to see whether 
they would grow and thrive, without those ordinances which 
Jesus Christ established particularly for their benefit. 

Jesus Christ says to his church, " Here, take these lambs, 
and feed them, and shelter them and watch over them, and 
protect them : " and what does the church do ? Why, turn 
them out alone upon the cold mountains, among the wild 
beasts, to starve or perish, to see whether they are alive or not. 
This whole system is as unphilosophical as it is unscriptural. 
Did Jesus Christ tell his churches to do so ? Did the God of 
Abraham teach any such doctrine as this, in regard to the 
children of Abraham ? Never. He never taught us to treat 
young converts in such a barbarous manner. It is the very 
best way that could be taken to render it doubtful whether 
they are converts. The very way to lead them into doubts 
and darkness, is to keep them away from the church, from its 
fellowship, and its ordinances. 

I have understood there is a church, not very far from here, 
who have passed a resolution that no young converts shall be 
admitted till they have had a hope for at least six months. 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 3*75 

Where did they get any such rule ? Not from the Bible, nor 
the example of the early churches. 

3. In examining young converts for admission to the church, 
their consciences should not be ensnared by examining them 
too extensively or minutely on doctrinal points. From the man- 
ner in which examinations are conducted in some churches, 
it would seem as if they expected that young converts would 
be all at once acquainted with the whole system of divinity, 
and able to answer every puzzling question in theology. The 
effect of it is, that young converts are perplexed and confused, 
and give their assent to things they, do not understand, and 
thus their conscience is ensnared, and consequently weakened 
"Why, one great design of receiving young converts into the 
church, is to teach them doctrines, but if they are to be kept 
out of the church till they understand the whole system of 
doctrines, this end is defeated. Will you keep them out till 
one main design of receiving them is accomplished by other 
means ? It is absurd. There are certain cardinal doctrines 
of Christianity, which are embraced in the experience of every 
true convert. And these, young converts will testify to, on 
their examination, if they are questioned in such a way as 
to draw out their knowledge, and not in such a way as to 
puzzle and confound them. The questions should be such, as 
are calculated to draw out from them what they have learned 
by experience, and not what they may have got in theory be- 
fore or since their conversion. The object is, not to find out how 
much they know, or how good scholars they are in divinity, 
as you would examine a school, or a number of young men 
striving for a premium. It is to find out whether they have a 
change of heart, to leam whether they have experienced the 
great truths of religion by their power in their own souls. 
You see therefore how absurd, and injurious too, it must be, 
to examine as is sometimes done, like a lawyer at the bar, 
cross-examining a suspicious witness. It should rather be 
like a faithful physician anxious to find out his patient's true 
condition, and therefore leading his mind, by inquiries and 
hints, to disclose the real symptoms of his case. 

You will always find, if you put your questions right, that 
real converts will see clearly those great fundamental points, 
the divine authority of the scriptures, the necessity of the in- 
fluences of the Holy Spirit, the divinity of Christ, the doctrine 
of total depravity and. regeneration, the necessity of the atone- 
ment, justification by faith, and the justice of the eternal pun- 
ishment of the wicked. By a proper course of inquiries you 
will find all these points come out, as a part of their experi- 



376 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

ence, if you put your questions in such a way that they un- 
derstand them. 

A church session in this city have, as we are informed, 
passed a vote, that no person *shall join that church till he 
will give his assent to the whole Presbyterian Confession of 
Faith, and adopt it as his " rule of faith and practice and 
Christian obedience. That is, they must read the book 
through, which is about three times as large as this hymn- 
book, and must understand it, and agree to it all, before they 
can be admitted to the church, before they can make a pro- 
fession of religion, or obey the command of Christ. By what 
authority does a church say that no one shall join their com- 
munion till he understands all the points and technicalities 
of this long confession of faith ? Is that their charity, to cram 
this whole confession of faith down the throat of a young con- 
vert, before they let him so much as come to the communion? 
He says, " I love the Lord Jesus Christ, and wish to obey his 
command." "Very well, but do you understand and adopt 
the confession of faith ? " He says, " I do not know, for I 
never read that, but I have read the Bible, and I love that, 
and wish to follow the directions in it, and to come to the 
table of the Lord." "Do you love the confession of faith? If 
not you shall not come," is the reply of this charitable session, 
"you shall not sit down at the Lord's table, till you have 
adopted all this confession of faith." Did Jesus Christ ever 
authorise a church session to say this — to tell that child of 
God, who stands there with tears, and asks permission to 
obey his Lord, and who understands the grounds of his faith, 
and can give a satisfactory reason of his hope, to tell him he 
cannot join the church till he understands the confession of 
faith ? No doubt, Jesus Christ is angry with such a church, 
and he will show his displeasure in a way that admits of no 
mistake, if they do not repent. Shut the door against young 
converts till they swallow the confession of faith ! And will 
such a church prosper ? Never. 

No church on earth has a right to impose its extended con- 
fession of faith on a young convert, who admits the funda- 
mentals of religion. They may let the young convert know 
their own faith on ever so many points, and they may exam- 
ine him, if they think it necessary, as to his belief ; but sup- 
pose he has doubts on some points not essential to Christian 
experience, as the doctrine of Infant Baptism, or of Election, 
or the Perseverance of the Saints, and suppose he honestly 
and frankly tells you he has not made up his mind concerning 
these points. Has any minister or church a right to say, he 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 377 

shall not come to the Lord's table till he has finished all his 
researches into these subjects ? That he shall not obey Jesus 
Christ till he has fully made up his mind on every such point 
on which Christians, and devoted ones too, differ among them- 
selves ? I would sooner cut off my right hand than debar a 
convert under such circumstances. I would teach a young 
convert as well as I could in the time before he made his ap- 
plication, and I would examine him candidly as to his views, 
and after he was in the church, I would endeavor to make 
him grow in knowledge as he grows in grace. And by just 
as much confidence as I have that my own doctrines are the 
doctrines of God, I should expect to make him adopt them, 
if I could have a fair hearing before his mind. But I never 
would bid one, whom I charitably believed to be a child of 
God, to stay away from his Father's table, because he did not 
see all I see, or believe all I believe, through the whole sys- 
tem of divinity. The thing is utterly irrational, ridiculous, 
and wicked. 

4. Sometimes persons who are known to entertain a hope 
dare not make a profession of religion for fear they should be 
deceived. I would always deal decidedly with such cases. A 
hope that will not warrant a profession of religion is mani- 
festly worse than no hope, and the sooner it is torn away the 
better. Shall a man hope he loves God, and yet not dare 
obey Jesus Christ ? Preposterous ! Such a hope had better 
be given up at once. 

5. Sometimes persons professing to be converts will make 
an excuse for not joining the church, that they can enjoy re- 
ligion just as well without it. This is always suspicious. I 
should look out for such characters. It is almost certain they 
have no religion. Ordinarily, if a person does not desire to 
be associated with the people of God, he is rotten at the bot- 
tom. It is because he wants to keep out of the responsibili- 
ties of a public profession. He has a feeling within him that 
he had rather be free, so that he can by and by go back to the 
world again if he likes, without the reproach of instability or 
hypocrisy. Enjoy religion just as well without obeying Jesus 
Christ ! It- is false on the face of it. He overlooks the fact 
that religion consists in obeying Jesus Christ. 

m. I am to consider the importance of giving right in- 
struction to young converts. 

Ordinarily, their Christian character through life is moulded 
and fashioned according to the manner in which they are 
dealt with when first converted. There are many who have 
been poorly taught at first, but have been afterwards re-con- 



378 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

verted, and if they are then dealt with properly, they may be 
made something of. But the } )ro P er time ^° do ^^ * s when 
they are first brought in, when their minds are soft and ten- 
der, and easily yield to the truth. Then they may be led with 
a hair, if they think it is the truth of God. And whatever 
notions in religion they get then they are apt to cleave to for 
ever afterwards. It is almost impossible to get away a man's 
notions that he got when he was a young convert. You may 
reason him down, but he cleaves to them. How often is it 
the case where persons have been taught certain things when 
first converted, that if they afterwards get a new minister, 
who teaches somewhat differently, they will rise up against 
him, as if he were going to subvert the faith and car- 
ry away the church into error, and throw everything into 
confusion. Thus you see that young converts are thrown 
into the hands of the church, and it depends on the church 
to mould them, and form them into Christians of the right 
stamp. Much of their future comfort and usefulness depends 
on the manner in which they are instructed at the outset. 
The future character of the church, the progress of revivals, 
the coming of the millennium, depend on having right instruc- 
tion given, and a right direction of thought and life to those 
who are young converts. 

IV. I am to mention some things which should not be taught 
to young converts. 

1. " You will not always feel as you do now." When the 
young convert is rejoicing in his Saviour, and calculating to 
live for the glory of God and the good of mankind, how often 
is he met with this reply, "You will not always feel so." 
Thus preparing his mind to expect that he shall backslide, 
and not to be much surprised when he does. This is just the 
way the devil wants young converts dealt with, to have old 
Christians tell them, your feelings will not last, and that by 
and by you will be as cold as we are. It has made my heart 
bleed to see it. When the young convert has been pouring 
out his warm heart to some old professor, and expecting to 
meet the warm burstings of a kindred spirit responding to 
his own, what does he meet with ? This cold answer, coming 
like a northern blast over his soul, " You will not always feel 
so." SHAME ! Just preparing the young convert to expect 
that he shall backslide as a matter of course ; so that when 
he begins to decline, as under the very influences of this in- 
struction it is most likely he will, it produces no surprise or 
alarm in his mind, but he looks at it just as a thing of course, 
doing as everybody else does. 



INSTRTCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 379 

I have heard it preached as well as prayed, that seasons of 
backsliding are necessary to test the church. They say, 
" when it rains, you can find water anywhere ; it is only in 
seasons of drought that you can tell where the deep springs 
are." Wonderful logic ! And so you would teach that Chris- 
tians must get cold and stupid, and backslide from God, and 
for what reason ? Why, forsooth, to show that they are not 
hypocrites. Amazing ! You would prove that they are hyp- 
ocrites in order to show that they are not. 

Such doctrine as this is the very last that should be taught 
to young converts. They should be told that now they have 
only begun the Christian life, and that their religion is to con- 
sist in going on in it. They should be taught to go forward 
all the time, and grow in grace continually. Do not teach 
them to taper off their religion, let it grow smaller and 
smaller till it comes to a point. God says, " The path of .the 
just is as the shining light, that shineth more mid more to 
the perfect day." Now whose path is that which grows dim- 
mer and dimmer until the perfect night? They should be 
brought to such a state of mind that the first indications of 
decay in spirituality or zeal will alarm them and spur them 
up to duty. There is no need that young converts should 
backslide as they do. Paul did not backslide. And I do 
not doubt that this very doctrine, " You will not always feel 
so," is one of the grand devices of Satan to bring about the 
result which it predicts. 

2. " Leam to walk by faith and not by sight." This is 
sometimes said to young converts in reference to their con- 
tinuing to exhibit the power of religion, and is a manifest per- 
version of Scripture. If they begin to lose their faith #nd 
zeal, and to get into darkness, some old professor will tell 
them, "Ah, you cannot expect to have the Saviour always 
with you, you have been walking by sight, you must learn to 
walk by faith and not by sight." That is, you must learn to 
get as cold as death, and then hang on to the doctrine of the 
Saints' Perseverance, as your only ground of hope that you 
shall be saved. And that is walking by faith. Cease to per- 
severe, and then held on to the doctrine of 'perseverance. "One 
of guilt's blunders, and the loudest laugh of hell." And liv- 
ing in the enjoyment of God's favor and the comforts of the 
Holy Ghost, they call walking by sight ! Do you suppose 
young converts see the Saviour at the time they believe on 
him ? WTien they are so full of the enjoyments of heaven, 
do you suppose they see heaven, and so walk by sight ? It is 
absurd on the face of it. It is not faith, it is presumption, 



380 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

that makes a backslider hold on to the doctrine of persever- 
ance, as if that would save him, without any sensible exercise 
of godliness in his soul. Those who attempt to walk by faith 
in this way had better take care, or they will walk into hell 
with their faith. Faith indeed! Faith without works is 
dead. Can dead faith make the soul live ? 

3. "Wait till you see whether you can hold out." When 
a young convert feels zealous and warm-hearted, and wants 
to lay himself out for God, some prudent old professor will 
caution him not to go too fast. " You had better not be too 
forward in religion, till you see whether you can hold out ; 
for if you take this high ground and then fall, you will dis- 
grace religion." That is, in plain English, " Do not do any- 
thing that constitutes religion, till you see whether you have 
religion." Beligion consists in obeying God. Now these 
wise teachers tell a young convert, " Do not obey God till 
you see" — what ? — till you see whether you have obeyed him — 
or, till you see whether you have gotten that substance, that 
mysterious thing which they imagine is created and put into 
a man, like a lump of new flesh, and called religion. This wait- 
ing system is all alike, and all wrong. There is no Scripture' 
warrant for telling a person to wait, when the command of 
God is upon him and the path of duty before him. Let him 
go along. 

Young converts should be fully taught that this is the only 
consistent way to find out whether they have any religion.-— 
The only evidence they can have is to find that they are 
heartily engaged in doing the will of God. To tell him to 
wait, therefore, before he does these things, till he gets his evi- 
dence, is reversing the matter, and is absurd. 

4. "Wait till you get strength, before you take up the 
cross." This is applied to various religious duties. Some- 
times it is applied to prayer, just as if prayer was a cross. 
But I have known young converts advised not to attempt to 
pray in their families, or not to attempt quite yet to pray in 
meetings and social circles. " Wait till you get strength." 
Just as if they would get strength without exercise. Strength 
comes by exercise. You cannot get strength by lying still. 
Let a child lie in the cradle all his life, and he would never 
have any strength, he might grow in size, but he never could 
be any thing more than a great baby. This is a law of na- 
ture. There is no substitute for exercise in producing strength. 
The body as every one knows, can be strengthened only by 
exercise. It is so in the nature of things. And it is just so 
with the mind. It is so with the affections, so with the judg- 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 381 

ment, so with conscience. AH the powers of the soul are 
strengthened by exercise. I need not now enter into the philoso- 
phy of this. Every body knows it is so. If the mind is not 
exercised, the brain will not grow, and the man will become 
an idiot. If the affections are not exercised he will become a 
stoic. To talk to a convert about neglecting Christian action 
till he gets strength, is absurd. If he wants to gain strength, 
let him go to work. 

5. Young converts should not be made sectarian in their feel- 
ings. They should not be taught to dwell upon sectarian dis- 
tinctions, or to be sticklish about sectarian points. They 
ought to examine these points, at a proper time, and in a 
proper way, and make up their minds for themselves, accord- 
ing to their importance. But they should not be taught to 
dwell upon them, or to make much of them in the outset of 
their religious life. Otherwise there is great danger that their 
whole religion will run into sectarianism. I have seen some 
most sad and melancholy exhibitions of the effects of this up- 
on young converts. And whenever I see professed converts 
taking a strong hold of sectarian peculiarities, no matter of 
what denomination of Christians, I always feel in doubt 
about them. When I hear them asking, " Do you believe in 
the doctrine of election?" or, "Do you believe in sprink- 
ling ?" or, " Do you believe in plunging ?'*' I feel sad. I never 
knew such converts to be worth much. Their sectarian zeal 
soon sours their feelings, eats out all the heart of their re- 
ligion, and moulds their whole character into sinful sectarian 
bigotry. They generally become mighty zealous for the tra- 
ditions of the elders, and very little concerned for the salva- 
tion of souls. 

V. I proceed to mention some of the things which it is im- 
portant should be taught to young converts. 

1. One of the first things young converts should be taught is 
to distinguish between emotion and principle in religion. Do 
you understand me ? I am going to explain what I mean, but 
I want you to get hold of the words, and have them fixed in 
your mind. What I want is to have you distinguish between 
emotion and principle. 

By emotion, I mean that state of mind of which we are 
conscious, and which we call feeling, an involuntary state of 
mind, that arises of course when we are in certain circum- 
stances or under certain influences. There may be high- 
wrought feelings, or they may subside into tranquillity, or 
disappear entirely. But these emotions should be carefully 
distinguished from religious principle. By principle I do not 



382 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

mean any substance or root or seed or sprout implanted in 
the soul. But I mean the voluntary decision of the mind, the 
firm determination to act out duty and to obey the will of 
God, by which a Christian should always be governed. "When 
a man is fully determined to obey God, because it is RIGHT 
that he should obey God, I call that principle. Whether he 
feels any lively religious emotion at the time or not, he will 
do his duty cheerfully, and readily, and heartily, whatever 
may be the state of his feelings. This is acting upon princi- 
ple, and not from emotion. Many young converts have mis- 
taken views upon this subject, and depend almost entirely 
upon the state of their feelings to go forward in duty. Some 
will not lead in a prayer meeting, unless they feel as if they 
could make an eloquent prayer. Multitudes are influenced 
almost entirely by their emotions, and they give way to this, 
as if they thought themselves under no obligation to duty un- 
less urged on by some strong emotion. They will be very 
zealous in religion when they feel like it, when their emotions 
are warm and lively, but they will not act out religion con- 
sistently, and carry it into all the concerns of life. They are 
religious only as they are impelled by a gush of feeling. But 
this is not true religion. 

Young converts should be carefully taught, when duty is 
before them to do it. However dull their feelings may be, if 
duty calls, do it. Do not wait for feeling, but DO IT. Most 
likely the very emotions for which you would wait will be 
called into exercise when you begin to do your duty. If the 
duty is prayer, for instance, and you have not the feelings you 
would wish, do not wait for emotions before you pray, but 
pray, and open your mouth wide. And in doing it, you are 
most likely to have the emotions for which you were inclined 
to wait, and which constitute the conscious happiness of re- 
ligion. 

2. Young converts should be taught that they have re- 
nounced the ownership of all their possessions, and of themselves, or 
if they have not done this they are not Christians. They should 
not be left to think that any thing is their own, their time, 
property, influence, faculties, bodies or souls. "Ye are not 
your' own ;" all belongs to God ; and when they submitted to 
God they made a free surrender of all to him, to be ruled and 
disposed of at his pleasure. They have no right to spend 
one hour as if their time was their own. No right to go any- 
where, or do anything, for themselves, but should hold all at 
the disposal of God, and employ all for the glory of God. If 
they do not, they ought not to call themselves Christians, for 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 383 

the very idea of being a Christian is to renounce self and be- 
come entirely consecrated to God. A man has no more right 
to withhold anything from God, than he has to rob or steal. 
It is robbery in the highest sense of the term. It is an in- 
finitely higher crime than it would be for a clerk in a store to 
go and take the money of his employer, and spend it on his 
own lusts and pleasures. I mean, that for a man to withhold 
from God, is a higher crime against him, than a man can com- 
mit against his fellow man, inasmuch as God is the owner of 
all things in an infinitely higher sense than man can be the 
owner of anything. If God calls on them to employ any- 
thing they have, their money, or their time, or to give their 
children, or to dedicate themselves, in advancing his king- 
dom, and they refuse, because they want to use them in their 
own way, or prefer to do something else, it is vastly more 
blamable than for a clerk or an agent to go and embezzle the 
money that is intrusted to him by his employer, and spend it 
for his family, or lay it out in bank stock or in speculation for 
himself. 

God is, in an infinitely higher sense, tJie owner of all, than 
any employer can be said to be the owner of what he has. 
And the church of Christ never will take high ground, never 
will be disentangled from the world, never will be able to go 
forward without these continual declensions and backslidings, 
until Christians, and the churches generally, take the ground, 
and hold to it, that it is just as much a matter of discipline 
for a church member practically to deny his stewardship as to 
deny the divinity of Christ, and that covetousness fairly 
proved shall just as certainly exclude a man from communion 
as adultery. 

The church is mighty orthodox in notions, but very hereti- 
cal in practice, but the time must come when the church will 
be just as vigilant in guarding orthodoxy in practice as or- 
thodoxy in doctrine, and just as prompt to turn out heretics 
in practice as heretics that corrupt the doctrines of the Gospel. 
In fact, it is vastly more important. The only design of doctrine 
is to produce practice, and it does not seem to be understood 
by the church, that true faith " works by love and purifies the 
heart," that heresy in practice, is. proof conclusive of heresy 
in sentiment. The church are very sticklish for correct doc- 
trine and very careless about correct living. This is prepos- 
terous. Has it come to this, that the church of Jesus Christ 
is to be satisfied with correct notions on some abstract 
points, and never reduce her orthodoxy to practice ? Let it 
be so no longer. 



384 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

It is high time these matters were set right. And the only 
way to set them right, is to begin right with those who are 
just entering upon religion. Young converts must be told 
that they are just as worthy of damnation, and that the 
church cannot and will not hold fellowship with them, if they 
show a covetous spirit, and turn a deaf ear when the whole 
world is calling for help, as if they were living in adultery, or 
in the daily worship of idols. 

3. Teach them how to cultivate a tender conscience. I have 
often been amazed to find how little conscience there is, even 
among those who we hope are Christians. And here we see 
the reason of it. Their consciences were never cultivated. 
They never were taught and told how to cultivate a tender 
conscience. They have not even a natural conscience. They 
have dealt so rudely with their conscience, and resisted it so 
often, that it has got blunted, and does not act. The useful- 
ness of a Christian, greatly depends on his knowing how to 
cultivate his conscience. Young converts should be taught 
to keep their conscience just as tender as the apple of the 
eye. They should watch their conduct and then* motives, 
and let their motives be so pure and their conduct so disin- 
terested as not to offend or injure or stifle conscience. They 
should maintain such a habit of listening to conscience, that 
it will be always ready to give forth a stern verdict on all oc- 
casions. It is astonishing to see how much the conscience 
may be cultivated by a proper course. If rightly attended 
to, it made be made so pure, and so powerful, that it will al- 
ways respond exactly to the word of God. Present any duty 
to such a Christian, or any self-denial, or suffering, and only 
show him the word of God and he will do it without a word. 
In a few months, if properly taught and attended to, young 
converts may have a conscience so delicately poised that the 
weight of a feather will turn them. Only bring a " Thus 
said the Lord/' and they will be always ready to do that, be 
it what it may. 

4. Young converts should be taught to pray without ceoMng. 
That is, they should always keep up a watch over their 
minds, and be all the time in a prayerful spirit. They should 
be taught to pray always, whatever may take place. For 
the want of right instruction on this point many young con- 
verts suffer loss and get far away from God. For instance, 
sometimes it happens that a young convert will fall into 
some sin, and then he feels as if he could not pray, and in- 
stead of overcoming this he feels so distressed that he 
waits for the keen edge of his distress to pass away. In- 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 385 

stead of going right to Jesus in the midst of his agony, and 
confessing his sin out of the fulness of his heart and getting 
a renewed pardon and peace restored, he waits till all the 
keenness of his feelings have subsided, and then his repent- 
ance, if he does repent, is cold and half-hearted. Let me tell 
you, beloved, never to do this, but when your conscience 
presses you, go then right to Christ, confess your sin fully, 
and pour out your heart to God. 

Sometimes people will neglect to pray because they are in 
the dark, and feel no desire to pray. But that is the very 
time when they need prayer. That is the very reason why 
they ought to pray. You should go right to God and con- 
fess your coldness and darkness of mind. Tell him just how 
you feel. Tell him, " O Lord, 1 have no desire to pray, but I 
know I ought to pray." And the first you will know, the 
Spirit may come, and lead your heart out in prayer, and all 
the dark clouds will pass away. 

5. Young converts should be faithfully warned against 
adopting a fake standard in religion. They should not be left 
to fall in behind old professors, and keep them before their 
minds as a standard of holy living. They should always 
look at Christ as their model. Not aim at being as good 
Christians as the old church members, and not think they are 
doing pretty well because they are as much awake as the 
old members of the church. But they should aim at being 
holy, and not rest satisfied till they are perfect as God. The 
church has been greatly injured for the want of attention to 
this matter. Young converts have come forward, and their 
hearts were warm and their zeal ardent enough to aim at a 
high standard, but they were not directed properly, and so 
they soon settle down into the notion that what is good 
enough for others is good enough for them, and therefore 
they never aim higher than those who are before them. And 
in this way the church instead of rising with every revival, 
higher and higher in holiness, is kept nearly stationary. 

6. Young converts should be taught to do all their duty. 
They should never make a compromise with duty, nor think 
of saying, " I will do this as an offset for neglecting that" 
They should never rest satisfied till they have done their duties 
of every kind, in relation to their families, the church Sab- 
bath Schools, the impenitent around them, the disposal of 
their property, the conversion of the world. Let them do 
their duty, as they feel it when their hearts are warm ; and 
never attempt to pick and choose among the commandments 
of God. 

17 



386 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

7. They should be made to feel that they have no separate 
interest It is time Christians were made actually to feel 
that they have no interest whatever, separate from the in- 
terest of Jesus Christ and his kingdom. They should under- 
stand that they are incorporated into the family of Jesus 
Christ, as members in full, so that their whole interest is 
identified with his. They are embarked with him, they have 
gone on board, and taken them all And henceforth they 
have nothing to do, or nothing to say, except as it is con- 
nected with this interest and bears on the cause and kingdom 
of Christ. 

8. They should be taught to maintain singleness of motive. 
Young converts should not begin to have a double mind, on 
any subject, or let selfish motives mingle in with good mo- 
tives in anything they do. But this can never be, so long 
as Christians are allowed to hold a separate interest of their 
own, distinct from the interest of Jesus Christ. If they feel 
that they have a separate interest, it is impossible to keep them 
from regarding it, and having an eye to it as well as to Christ's 
interest, in many things that they do. It is only by becom- 
ing entirely consecrated to God, and giving up all to his ser- 
vice, that they can ever keep their eye single and their mo- 
tives pure. 

9. They should set out with a determination to aim at being 
useful in the highest degree possible. They should not rest 
satisfied with merely being useful, or remaining in a situation 
where they can do some good. But if they see an oppor- 
tunity where they can do more good, they must embrace it, 
whatever may be the sacrifice to themselves. No matter 
what it may cost them, no matter what danger or what suf- 
fering, no matter what change in their outward circumstances, 
or habits, or employments it may lead to. If they are satis- 
fied that they will on the whole do more good, they should 
not even hesitate. How else can they be like God ? How 
can they think to bear the image of Jesus Christ, if they are 
not prepared to do all the good that is in their power ? When 
a man is converted he comes into a new world, and should 
consider himself as a new man. If he finds he can do the 
most good by remaining in his old employment, let it be 
so. But if he can do more good in some other way, he is 
bound to change. It is for the want of attention to this sub- 
ject, in the outset, that Christians have got such low ideas on 
the subject of duty. And that is the reason why there are 
so many useless members in our churches. 

10. They must be taught not to aim at comfort but useful- 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 387 

ness in religion. There are a great many spiritual epicures 
in the churches, who are all the while seeking to be happy 
in religion, while they take very little pains to be useful. 
They had much rather spend their time in singing joyful 
hymns, and in pouring out their happy feelings in a gushing 
tide of exultation and triumph, than to spend it in agoniz- 
ing prayer for sinners, or in going about and pulling dying 
men out of the fire. They seem to feel as if they were born 
to enjoy themselves. But I do not think such Christians 
show such fruits as to make their example one to be imitated. 
Such was not the temper of the apostles. They travailed 
for souls, and laboured in weariness and painfuhiess, and in 
deaths oft, to save sinners. Nor is it safe. Ordinarily, Chris- 
tians are not qualified to drink deep at the fountain of joy. 
In ordinary cases, a deep agony of prayer for souls is more pro- 
fitable than high flights of joy. Let young converts be taught, 
plainly, not to calculate upon a life of joy and triumph. 
They may be called to go through fiery trials. Satan may 
sift them like wheat. But they must go forward, not calcu- 
lating so much to be happy as to be useful, not talking about 
comfort but duty, not desiring nights of joy and triumph, 
but hungering and thirsting after righteousness, not studying 
how to create new nights of rapture, but how to know the 
will of God, and do it. They will be happy enough in heaven. 
* There they may sing the song of Moses and the Lamb. And 
they will in fact enjoy a more solid and rational happiness 
here, by thinking nothing about it, but patiently devoting 
themselves to do the will of God. 

11. They should be taught to have moral courage, and not 
to be afraid of going forward in duty. The Bible insists 
fully on Christian boldness and courage in action as a duty. 
I do not mean that they should indulge in their bravadoes, 
like Peter, telling what they will do, and boasting of their 
courage. The boaster is generally a coward at heart. But 
I mean moral courage, a humble and fixed decision of pur- 
pose, that will go forward in any duty, unangered and un- 
awed, with the meekness and firmness of the Son of God. 

12. They should be so instructed as to be sound in the 
faith. That is, they should be early made, as far as possible, 
complete and correct in regard to their doctrinal belief. As 
soon as may be, without turning their minds off from their 
practical duties, in promoting the glory of God and the sal- 
vation of men, they should be taught fully and plainly, all 
the leading doctrines of the Bible. Doctrinal knowledge is 
indispensable to growth in grace. Knowledge is the food of 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

the mind. " That the soul be without knowledge/' says the 
Wise Man, " It is not good." The mind cannot grow with- 
out knowledge any more than the body without food. And 
therefore it is important that young converts should be thor- 
oughly indoctrinated, and made to understand the Bible. 
By indoctrinating I do not mean teaching the catechism, but 
teaching them to draw knowledge from the fountain head. 
Create in their minds such an appetite for knowledge that 
they will eat the Bible up, will devour it, will love it and love 
it all. A 11 scripture is profitable, that the man of God may 
be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. 

13. Great pains should be taken to guard young converts 
against censoriousness. Young converts, when they first come 
out on the Lord's side, and are all warm and zealous, some- 
times find old professors so cold and dead that they are 
strongly tempted to be censorious. This should be corrected 
immediately, otherwise the habit will poison their minds and 
destroy their religion. 

14. They must learn to sag, No. This is a very difficult 
lesson to many. See that young woman. Formerly she 
loved the gay circle, and took delight in its pleasures. She 
joined the church, and then found herself aloof from all her 
old associates. They ask her not now to their balls and 
parties, because they know she will not join them, and per- 
haps they keep entirely away for a time, for fear she should* 
converse with them about their souls. But by and by they 
grow a little bold, and some of them venture to ask her just 
to take a ride with a few friends. She does not like to say, 
No. They are her old friends, only a few of them are going, 
and surely a ride is so innocent a recreation, that she accepts 
the invitation. But now she has begun to comply, the ice 
is broken, and they have her again as one of them. It goes 
on, and she begins to attend their social visits — " only a few 
friends/ 5 you know, till by and by the carpet is taken up for 
a dance, and the next thing, perhaps, she is gone to a sleigh 
ride, on Saturday night, and comes home after midnight, and 
then sleeps all the forenoon on the Sabbath to make up for 
it, perhaps communion Sabbath too. All for the want of 
learning to say, No. 

See that young man. For a time he was always in his 
place in the Sabbath School and in the prayer meeting. But 
by and by his old friends begin to treat him with attention 
again, and they draw him along step by step. Every one 
seems a very small thing, and it would look like rudeness to 
deny so small a thing. He reasons that if he refuses to go 



INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 389 

with them in things that are innocent, he will lose his in- 
fluence with them. And so he goes on, till prayer meeting, 
Bible class, and even Bible and closet are neglected. Ah, 
young man, stop there ! Go only a little farther without 
learning to say Xo, and you are gone. If you do not 
wish to hang up the cause of Christ to scorn and contempt, 
learn to resist the beginnings of temptation. Otherwise it 
will come upon you, by and by, like the letting out of water. 

15. They should be taught what is and what is not Christian 
experience. It is necessary, both for their comfort and 
their usefulness, that they should understand this, so that 
they need not run themselves into needless distress for the 
want of that which is by no means essential to Christian ex- 
perience, nor flatter themselves that they have more religion 
than they really exercise. But I cannot dwell on this topic 
to-night. 

16. Teach them not to count anything a sawifice which 
they do for God. Some persons are always telling about the 
sacrifices they make in religion. I have no confidence in 
such piety. Why keep telling about their sacrifices, as if 
everything they did for God was a sacrifice. If they loved 
God they would not talk so. If they considered their own 
interests and the interest of Christ identical, they would not 
talk of making sacrifices for Christ ; it would be like talking 
of making sacrifices for themselves. 

17. It is of great importance that young converts should 
be taught to be strictly honest. I mean more by this than 
perhaps you would think. It is a great thing to be strictly 
honest. It is being very different from the world at large, and 
very different even from the great body of professors of re- 
ligion. The holiest man I ever knew, and one who had been 
many years a Christian and a minister, once made the remark 
to me, " Brother, it is a great thing to be strictly honest, up- 
right, straight in everything, so that God's pure eye can see 
that the mind is perfectly upright." 

It is of the utmost importance that young converts should 
understand what it is to be strictly honest in everything, so 
that they can maintain a conscience void of offence, both 
towards God and towards men. Alas, alas ! how little con- 
science there is. How little of that real honesty, that pure, 
simple uprightness, which ought to mark the life of a child 
of God. How little do many regard even an express promise. 
I heard the other day of a number of individuals who sub- 
scribed to the Anti-Slavery Society, and not half of them will 
pay their subscriptions. The plea is, that they signed when 



390 INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

they were under excitement, and they do not choose to pay. 
Just as if their being excited released them from the obliga- 
tion to keep their promise. "Why it is just as dishonest as it 
would be to refuse payment of a note of hand. They prom- 
ised, signed their names, did they, and now will not pay ? 
And they call that honesty ! 

I have heard that there are a number of men in the city 
who have signed hundreds of dollars for the Oneida Insti- 
tute, promising to pay the money when called on ; and 
when they were called on they refused to pay the money. 
And the reason was, they had all turned abolitionists in the 
Institute. Very well. Suppose they have. Does that alter 
your promise ? Did you sign on the condition that if they 
got Abolitionism introduced there you should be clear ? 
If you did, then you are clear. But if you gave your prom- 
ise without any condition, it is just as dishonest to refuse as 
if you had given a note of hand. And yet some of you might 
be almost angry if anybody should charge you with refusing 
to pay money when you promised it. 

Look at this seriously. Who does God say will go to 
heaven? Read the 15th Psalm, and see. "He that sweareth 
to his own hurt, and change th not." What do you think of 
that ? If a man has promised anything, except it be to commit 
sin, let him keep his promise, if he means to be honest or to 
go to heaven. But here these people will make promises, and 
because they cannot be prosecuted, will break them as easily 
as if they were nothing. They would not let a note be pro- 
tested at the bank. Why ? Because they would lose credit, 
and would be sued. But the Oneida Institute, and the 
Anti-Slavery Society, and other societies, will not sue for the 
money, and therefore these people take some offence at some- 
thing, and refuse to pay. Is this honest ? Will such hon- 
esty as this get them admitted to heaven ? WTiat ? Break 
your promises, and go up and carry a he in your hand before 
God ? If you refuse or neglect to fulfill your promise you are 
a liar, and if you persist in this, you shall have your part in the 
lake that burns with fire and brimstone. I would not, for 
ten thousand worlds, die with money in my hands, that I 
had unrighteously withheld from any object to which I had 
promised it. Such money will "eat like a canker." 

If you are not able to pay the money, that is a good excuse. 
But then say so. But if you refuse to pay what you have 
promised, because you have altered your mind, rely upon it, 
you are guilty. You cannot pray till you pay that money. 
W^iat will you pray ? " O Lord, I promised to give that 






INSTRUCTIONS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 391 

money^ but I altered my mind, and broke my promise ; but 
still, O Lord, I pray thee to bless me, and forgive my sin, al- 
though I keep my money, and make me happy in thy love." 
Will such prayers be heard ? Never. 

But, brethren, I find it impossible to touch upon all the 
points I intended to speak upon, and so I will break off here, 
and finish this subject another time. 



LECTURE XX 

INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 
Text.— Feed my lambs.— John xxi. 15. 

I remarked on this text in my last lecture, and was obliged, 
for want of time, to omit many of the points winch I wished 
to present in regard to the 

INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 

To-night I propose to continue the subject by noticing, 

I. Several other points upon which young converts ought 
to be instructed. 

II. To show the manner in which young converts should 
be treated by the church. 

m. Mention some of the evils which naturally result from 
defective instructions given in that stage of Christian expe- 
rience. 

I. I shall pursue the subject, taking it up where I left off, 
by mentioning some further instructions which it is impor- 
tant should be given to young converts. 

1. It is of great importance that young converts should 
early be made to understand lohat religion consists in. Per- 
haps you will be surprised at my mentioning this. " What ! 
Are they converts, and do they not know what religion con- 
sists in ?" I answer, They would know, if they had had no 
instruction but such as is drawn from the Bible. But multi- 
tudes of people have imbibed such notions about religion, 
that not not only young converts, but a great part of the 
church do not know what religion consists in, so as to have a 
clear and distinct idea of it. There are many ministers who 
do not. I do no not mean to say that they have no religion, 
for it may be charitably believed they have ; but what I mean 
is, that they do not discriminate as to what it consists in, and 
cannot give a correct statement of what does and what does 
not constitute real religion. It is important that young 
converts should be taught. 

Negatively, what religion does not consist in. 

(1.) Not in doctrinal knowledge. Knowledge is essential to 
(392) 



INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 393 

religion, but it is not religion. The devil has doctrinal 
knowledge, but he has no religion. A man may have doc- 
trinal knowledge to any extent without a particle of re- 
ligion. ' Yet some people have very strange ideas on this 
subject, as though having doctrinal knowledge indicated an 
increase of piety. I once heard a remark of this kind : in 
a certain instance, where some young converts had made 
rapid progress in doctrinal knowledge, a person who saw it 
said, "How these young converts grow in grace." Here 
he confounded improvement in knowledge with improve- 
ment in piety. The truth was, that he had no means of 
judging of their growth in grace, and it was no evidence of it 
because they were making progress in doctrinal knowledge. 

(2.) They should be taught that religion is not a substance. 
It is not any root, or sprout, or seed, or anything else in the 
mind, as a part of the mind itself. Persons often speak of re- 
ligion as if it was something that may be covered up in the 
mind, just as a spark of fire may be covered up in the ashes, 
which does not show itself, and which produces no effects, but 
yet lives and is ready to act as soon as it is uncovered. And 
in like manner they think they may have religion, as some- 
thing remaining in them, although they do not manifest it by 
obeying God. But they should be taught that this is not the 
nature of religion. It is no part of the mind itself, or of the 
body, nor is it a root, or seed, or spark, that can exist and 
yet be hid and produce no effect. 

(3.) Teach them that religion does not consist in raptures, 
or ecstacies, or high flights of feeling. There may be a great 
deal of these where there is religion. But it ought to be un- 
derstood that they are all involuntary emotions, and may ex- 
ist in full power where there is no religion. They may be the 
mere workings of the imagination, without any truly religious 
affection at all. Persons may have them to such a degree as 
actually to swoon away with ecstacy, even on the subject of 
religion, without having any religion. I have known one 
person almost carried away with rapture, by a mere view of 
the natural attributes of God, his power and wisdom, as dis- 
played in the starry heavens, and yet the person had no re- 
ligion. Beligion is obedience to God, the voluntary submis- 
sion of the soul to the will of God. 

(4.) Neither does religion consist in going to meeting or 
reading the Bible, or praying, or any other of what are com- 
monly called religious duties. The very phrase, "religious 
duties," ought to be striken out of the vocabulary of young 
converts. They should be made to know that these acts are 
17* 



394 INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 

not religion. Many become very strict in performing certain 
things, which they call religious duties, and suppose that is be- 
ing religious ; while they are careless about the ordinary du- 
ties of life, which in fact constitute A LIFE OF PIETY. 
Prayer may be an expression and an act of piety, or it may 
not be. Going to church or to a prayer meeting, may be con 
sidered either as a means, an act, or an expression of pious 
sentiment ; but the performance of these does not constitute 
a man a Christian, and there may be great strictness and zeal 
in these, without a particle of religion. If young converts 
are not taught to discriminate, they may be led to think there 
is something peculiar in what are called religious duties, and 
to imagine they have a great deal of religion because they 
abound in certain actions that are commonly called religious 
duties, although they may at the same time be very defi- 
cient in honesty or faithfulness or punctuality, or temper- 
ance, or any other of what they choose to call their common 
duties. They may be very punctilious in some things, may 
tithe mint, anise and cummin, and yet neglect the weightier 
matters of the law, justice and the love of God. 

(5.) Religion does not consist in desires to do good actions. 
Desires that do not result in choice and action are not virtu- 
ous. Nor are such desires necessarily vicious. They may 
arise involuntarily in the mind, in view of certain objects, but 
while they produce no voluntary act, they are no more virtu- 
ous or vicious than the beating of the pulse, except in cases 
where we have indirectly willed them into existence, by volun- 
tarily putting ourselves under circumstances to excite them. 
The wickedest man on earth may have strong desires after 
holiness. Did you ever think of that 1 He may see clearly 
that holiness is the only and indispensable means of happi- 
ness. And the moment he apprehends holiness as a means of 
happiness, he naturally desires it. It is to be feared, that multi- 
tudes are deceiving themselves with the supposition, that a 
desire for holiness, as a means of happiness, is religion. 
Many, doubtless, give themselves great credit for desires that 
never result in choosing right. They feel desires to do their 
duty, but do not choose to do it, because upon the whole 
they have still stronger desires not to do it. In such desires, 
there is no virtue. An action or desire to be virtuous in the 
sight of God, must be an act of the will. People often talk 
most absurdly on this subject, as though their desires had any- 
thing good, while they remain mere desires. " I think I de- 
sire to do so and so.' But do you do it? " Oh, no, but I often 
feel a desire to do it." This is practical Atheism. 



INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 395 

Whatever desires a person may have, if they are not car- 
ried out into actual choice and action, they are not virtuous. 
And no degree of desire is itself virtuous. If this idea could be 
made prominent, and fully riveted in the minds of men, it 
would probably annihilate the hopes of half the church, who 
are living on their good desires, while doing nothing for 
God. 

(6.) They should be made to understand that nothing 
which is selfish, is religion. "Whatever desires they may 
have, and whatever choices and actions they may put forth, 
if after all the reason of them is selfish, there is no religion 
in them. A man may just as well commit sin in praying, or 
reading the Bible, or going to meeting, as in anything else, if 
his motive is selfish. Suppose a man prays simply with a 
view to promote his own happiness. Is that religion ? What 
is it, but attempting to make God his almighty servant ? It 
is nothing else but to attempt a great speculation, and put the 
universe, God and all, under contribution to make him happy. 
It is the sublime degree of wickedness. It is so far from be- 
ing piety, that it is in fact superlative wickedness. 

(7.) Nothing is acceptable to God, as religion, unless it be 
performed heartly, to please God. No outward action has 
anything good, or anything that God approves, unless it is 
performed from right motives, and from the heart. 

(a) Young converts should be taught fully and positively 
that all religion consists in obeying God from the heart. All 
religion consists in voluntary action. All that is holy, all that 
is lovely in the sight of God, all that is properly called religion, 
consists in voluntary action, in voluntarily obeying the will of 
God from the heart;. 

2. Young converts should be taught that the duty of self- 
denial is one of the leading features of the Gospel. They 
should uuderstand that they are not pious at all, any farther 
than they are willing to take up the cross daily, and deny 
themselves, for Christ. There is but very little self-denial in 
the church, and the reason is, that the duty is so much lost 
sight of, in giving instruction to young converts. How sel- 
dom are they told that self-denial is the leading feattoe of 
Christianity. In pleading for benevolent objects, how often 
will you find, that ministers and agents do not even ask Chris- 
tians to deny themselves for the sake of promoting the object. 
They only ask them to give what they can spare as well as 
not, or in other words, to offer unto the Lord that which costs 
them nothing. What an abomination ! They only ask for 
the surplus, for what they do not want, for what they can give 



396 INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 

just as well as not. There is no religion in this kind of giv- 
ing. A man may give to a benevolent object, a hundred 
thousand dollars, and there would be no religion in it, if he 
could give it as well as not, and there was no self-denial in it. 
Jesus Christ exercised self-denial to save sinners. So has 
God the Father exercised self-denial in giving his Son to die 
for us, and in sparing us, and in bearing with our perverse- 
ness. The Holy Ghost exercises self-denial, in condescending 
to strive with such unholy beings to bring them to God. The 
angels exercise self-denial, in watching over this world, The 
apostles planted the Christian religion among the nations by 
the exercise of self-denial. And are we to think of being re- 
ligious without any self-denial? Are we to call ourselves 
Christians, the followers of Christ, the temples of the Holy 
Ghost, and to claim fellowship with the apostles, when we 
have never deprived ourselves of anything that would promote 
our personal enjoyment for the sake of promoting Christ's 
kingdom ? Young converts should be made to see that unless 
they are willing to lay themselves out for God and ready to 
sacrifice life and everything else for Christ, they have not the 
Spirit of Christ, and are none of his. 

3. They must be taught what sanctijwation is. " What ! " 
you will say, " do not all who are Christians known what 
sanctification is ?" No, many do not. Multitudes would be 
as much at a loss to tell intelligibly what sanctification is, as 
they would be to tell what religion is. If the question were 
asked of every professor of religion in this city, What is 
sanctification ? I doubt if one in ten would give a right an- 
swer. They would blunder just as they do when they under- 
take to tell what religion is, and speak of it as something dor- 
mant in the soul, something that is put in, and lies there, 
something that may be practised or not, and still be in them. 
So they speak of sanctification as if it were a sort of wash- 
ing off of some defilement, or a purging out of some physical 
impurity. Or they will speak of it as if the faculties were 
steeped in sin, and sanctification is taking out the stains. 
This is the reason why some people will pray for sanctifica- 
tion, and practise sin, evidently supposing that sanctification 
is something that precedes obedience. They should be taught 
that sanctification is not something that precedes obedience, 
some change in the nature or the constitution of the souL 
But sanctification is obedience, and, as a progressive thing, 
consists in obeying God more and more perfectly and per- 
petually. 

4. Young converts should be taught so as to understand 



INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONTEXTS. 397 

what perseverance is. It is astonishing how people talk about 
perseverance. As if the doctrine of perseverance was " Once 
in grace, always in grace," or " Once converted, sure to go to 
heaven." This is not the idea of perseverance. The true 
idea is, that if a man is truly converted, he y/ill CONTINUE 
to obey Gon. And as a consequence, he will surely go to 
heaven. But if a person gets the idea, that because he is 
converted, therefore he will assuredly go to heaven, that man 
will almost assuredly go to hell. 

5. Young converts should be taught to be religious in every- 
thing. They should aim to be religious in every department 
of life and in all that they do. If they do not aim at this, 
they should understand that they have no religion at all. If 
they do not intend and aim to keep all the commandments of 
God, what pretence can they make to piety ? Whosoever 
shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is 
guilty of all. He is justly subject to the whole penalty. If 
he disobeys God habitually in one particular, he does not in 
fact obey him in any particular. Obedience to God consists 
in the state of the heart. It is being willing to obey God ; 
willing that God should rule in all things. But if a man 
habitually disobeys God, in any one particular, he is in a state 
of mind that renders obedience in anything else impossible. 
To say that in some things a man obeys God, out of respect 
to his authority, and that in some other things he refuses obe- 
dience, is absurd. The fact is that obedience to God consists 
in an obedient state of heart, a preference of God's authority 
and commandments to everything else. If, therefore, an in- 
dividual appears to obey in some things, and yet perseveringly 
and knowingly disobeys in any one thing, he is deceived. He 
offends in one point, and this proves that he is guilty of all ; 
in other words, that he does not, from the heart, obey at all. 
A man may pray half of the time and have no religion ; if 
he does not keep the commandments of God, his very prayers 
will be hateful to God. " He that turneth away his ear from 
hearing the law, even his prayer shall be abomination." Do 
you hear that ? If a man refuses to obey God's law, if he re- 
fuses to comply with any one duty, he cannot pray, he has no 
religion, his very devotions are hateful. 

6. Young converts, by proper instructions, are easily 
brought to be " temperate in all things" Yet this is a subject 
greatly neglected in regard to young converts, and almost 
lost sight of in the churches. There is a vast deal of intem- 
perance in the churches. I do not mean intemperate drink- 
ing } in particular, but intemperance in eating, and in living 



398 INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 

generally. There is in fact but little conscience about it in 
the churches. And therefore the progress of reform in the 
matter is so slow. Nothing but an enlightened conscience 
can carry forward a permanent reform. Ten years ago, most 
ministers used ardent spirit, and kept it in their houses to 
treat their friends and their ministering brethren with. And 
the great body of the members in the churches did the same. 
Now there are but few of either, who are not actual drunk- 
ards, that will do it. But still there are many that indulge 
without scruple in the use of wine. There are some ministers, 
and many professors, who will drink down wine that has as 
much spirit in it as brandy and water. This is intemperance. 
Chewing and smoking tobacco are mere acts of intemperance. 
If they use these mere stimulants when there is no necessity 
for it, what is that but intemperance ? That is not being 
temperate in all things. Until Christians shall have a con- 
science on this subject, and be made to feel that they have no 
right to be intemperate in anything, they will make but little 
progress in religion. It is well known, or ought to be, that 
TEA AND COFFEE have no nutriment in them. They are 
mere stimulants. They go through the system without being 
digested. The milk and sugar you put in them are nourish- 
ing. And so they would be just as much so if you mixed 
them with rum, and made milk punch. But the tea and the 
coffee afford no nourishment. Aid yet I dare say, that a ma- 
jority of the families in this city give more in a year for their 
tea and coffee, than they do to save the world from hell. 
Probably this is true respecting entire churches. Even 
agents of benevolent societies will dare to go through the 
churches soliciting funds for the support of missionary and 
other institutions, and yet use tea, coffee, and in some cases to- 
bacco. Strange ! There is now in this city an agent em- 
ployed in soliciting funds, who uses all three of these worse 
than useless stimulants. And he is, moreover, a minister of 
the Gospel ! No doubt many are giving five times as much 
for mere intemperance as they give for every effort to save 
the world. If the church could be made to know how much 
they spend for what are mere poisons, and nothing else, they 
would be amazed. Sit down and talk with many persons, 
and they will strenuously maintain that they cannot get along 
without these stimulants, these poisons, and they cannot give 
them up — no, not to redeem the world from eternal damna- 
tion. And very often they will absolutely show anger if ar- 
gued with, just as soon as the argument begins to pinch their 
consciences. Oh, how long shall the church show her hypo- 



INSTRUCTION OF YOUXG CONVERTS. 399 

critical face at the Monthly Concert, and pray God to save 
the world., while she is actually throwing away five times as 
much for sheer intemperance, as she will give to save the 
world. Some of you may think these are little things, and 
that it is quite beneath the dignity of the pulpit to lecture 
against tea and coffee. But I tell you it is a great mistake 
of yours, if you think these are little things, when they make 
the church odious in the sight of God, by exposing her hy- 
pocrisy and lust. Here is an individual who pretends he has 
given himself up to serve Jesus Christ, and yet he refuses to 
deny himself any darling lust, and then he will go and pray, 
" O Lord, save the world ; O Lord, thy kingdom come." I 
tell you it is hypocrisy. Shall such prayers be heard ? Un- 
less men are willing to deny themselves, I would not give a 
groat for the prayers of as many such professors as would 
cover the whole United States. 

These things must be taught to young converts. It must 
come to this point in the church, that men shall not be called 
Christians, unless they will cut off the right hand, and pluck 
out the right eye, and deny themselves for Christ's sake. A 
little thing ? See it poison the spirit of prayer ! See it de- 
base and sensualize the soul! Is that a trifle beneath the 
dignity of the pulpit ? When these intemperate indulgences 
of one kind and another, cost the church five times if not 
fifty times more than all they do for the salvation of the world. 

An estimate has recently been made, showing that the 
United States consume seven millions of dollars worth of 
coffee yearly ; and who does not know that a great part of 
this is consumed by the church. And yet, grave ministers and 
members of Christian churches are not ashamed to be seen 
countenancing this enormous waste of money ; while, at the 
same time, the poor heathen are sending upon every wind of 
heaven their agonizing wail for help. Heaven calls from 
above, "go preach the Gospel to every creature." Hell 
groans from beneath, and ten thousand voices cry out from 
heaven, earth and hell, " Bo something to save the world !" Do 
it now. Oh, now, or millions more are in hell through your 
neglect. And oh, tell it not in Gath, the church, the ministry, 
will not deny even their lusts to save a world. Is this Chris- 
tianity ? What business have you to use Christ's money for 
such a purpose ? Are you a steward ? Who gave you this 
liberty ? Look to it, lest it should be found at last that you 
have preferred self-gratification to obedience, and made a 
" god of your belly." 

The time to teach these things with effect is when they are 



400 INSTRUCTION OP YOUNG CONVERTS. 

young converts. If they are not properly taught then, if they 
get a wrong habit, and begin with an easy, self-indulgent mode 
of living, it is rare that they are ever thoroughly reformed. I 
have conversed with old professors on these subjects, and 
have been astonished at their pertinacious obstinacy in in- 
dulging their lusts. And I am satisfied that the church 
never can rise out of this sloth until young converts are faith- 
fully taught in the outset of their religious course to be tem- 
perate in all things. 

7. They should be taught to have just as much religion in 
all their business, as they have in prayer, or in going to meet- 
ing. They should be just as holy, just as watchful, aim just 
as singly at the glory of God, be just as sincere and solemn 
in all their daily employments, as when they come to the 
throne of grace. If they are not, their Sabbath perform- 
ances will be an abomination. 

8. They should be taught that it is necessary for them to 
be just as holy as they think ministers ought to be. There has for 
a long time been an idea that ministers are bound to be holy 
and practise self-deniaL And so they are. But it is strange 
they should suppose that ministers are bound to be any more 
holy than other people. They would be shocked to see a 
minister show levity, or running after the fashions, or getting 
out of temper, or living in a fine house, or riding in a coach. 
Oh, that is dreadful. It does not look well in a minister. 
Indeed ! For a minister's wife to wear such a fine bonnet, 
or such a silk shawl. Oh, no. But they think nothing of all 
this in a layman or a layman's wife. That is no offence at all. 
I am not saying that these things do look well in a minister ; 
I know they do not. -But they look, in God's eyes, just as 
well in a minister as they do in a layman. You have no more 
right to indulge in vanity and folly and pride than a minister. 
Can you go to heaven without being sanctified ? Can you be 
holy without living for God, and doing all that you do to his 
glory? I have heard professedly good men speak against 
ministers having large salaries, and living in an expensive 
style, when they themselves were actually spending a great 
deal more money for the support of their families than any 
ministers. What would be thought of a minister living in the 
style in which many professors of religion and elders of 
churches are living in this city ? Why everybody would say 
that they were hypocrites. But, it is just as much an evi- 
dence of hypocrisy in a layman to spend God's money to 
gratify his lusts, or to please the world, or his family, as it is 
for a minister to do the same. It is distressing to hear some 



INSTRUCTION OP YOUNG CONVERTS. 401 

of our foremost laymen talk of its being dishonorable to re- 
ligion to give ministers a large salary, and let them live in an 
expensive style, when it is a fact that their own expenses are, 
for the number of their families and the company they have, 
far above that of any minister. All this arises out of funda- 
mentally wrong notions imbibed while they were young con- 
verts. Young converts have been taught to expect that min- 
isters will have all the religion, especially all the self-denial, 
and so long as this continues there can be no hope that the 
church will ever do much for the glory of God, or the conver- 
sion of the world. There is nothing of all this in the Bible. 
Where has God said, " You, ministers, love God with all your 
heart and soul and mind and strength," or "You, ministers, 
do all that you do to the glory of God ? " This is said to all 
alike, and he who attempts to excuse himself from any duty 
or self-denial, from any watchfulness or sobriety, by putting 
it off upon ministers, or who ventures to adopt a lower scale 
of holy living for himself than he thinks is proper for a min- 
ister, is in great danger of proving himself a hypocrite, and 
paying the forfeit of his foolishness in hell. 

' Much depends on the instructions given to young converts. 
If they once get into the habit of supposing that they may in- 
dulge in things which they would condemn in a minister, it is 
ten to one if they ever get out of it. 

8. They should aim at being perfect. Every young convert 
should be taught that if it is not his pwpose to live without 
sin, he has not yet begun to be religious. What is religion, 
but supreme love to God and a supreme purpose of heart or 
disposition to obey God. If there is not this, there is no re- 
ligion at all. It is one thing to profess to be perfect, and an- 
other thing to profess and feel that you ought to be perfect. It 
is one thing to say that men ought to be perfect, and can be 
if they are so disposed, and another thing to say that they are 
perfect. If any are prepared to say that they are perfect, all 
I have to say is, Let them prove it. If they are so, I hope 
they will show it by their actions, otherwise we can never be- 
lieve they are perfect. 

But it is the duty of all to be perfect and to purpose entire, 
perpetual and universal obedience to God. It should be 
their constant purpose to live wholly to God, and obey all his 
commandments. They should live so that if they should sin 
it would be an inconsistency, an exception, an individual case, 
in which they act contrary to the fixed and general purpose 
and tenor of their lives. They ought not to sin at all ; they 
are bound to be as holy as God is, and young converts should 



402 INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 

be taught to set out in the right course, or they will never be 
right. 

9. They should be taught to exhibit their light. 

If the young convert does not exhibit his light, and hold it 
up to the world, it will go out. If he does not bestir himself, 
and go forth and try to enhghten those around him, his light 
will go out, and his own soul will soon be in darkness. 
Sometimes young converts seem disposed to be still and not do 
anything in public till they get a great deal of light, or a great 
deal of religion. But this is not the way. Let the convert 
use what he has ; let him hold up his little twinkling rush- 
light boldly and honestly, and then God will pour in the oil 
and make him like a blazing torch. But God will not take 
the trouble to keep a light burning that is hid. Why should 
he ? Where is the use ? 

This is the reason why so many people enjoy so little in re- 
ligion. They do not exert themselves to honor God. They 
keep what little they do enjoy so entirely to themselves, that 
there is no good reason why God should bestow blessings and 
benefits on them. 

10. They should be taught how to win soids to Christ. 
Young converts should be taught particularly what to do for 
this, and how to do it, and then taught to live for this end as 
the great leading object of life. How strange has been the 
course sometimes pursued. These persons have been con- 
verted, and there they are. They get into the church, and 
then they are left to go along in their business just as they 
did before ; they do nothing and are taught to do nothing for 
Christ, and the only change is that they go more regularly to 
church on the Sabbath, and let the minister feed them, as it 
is called. But suppose he does feed them, they do not grow 
strong, for they cannot digest it, because they take no exer- 
cise. They become spiritual dyspeptics. Now the great 
object for which Christians are converted and left in this 
world, is to pull sinners out of the fire. If they do not effect 
this, they had better be dead. And young converts should 
be taught this as soon as they are born into the kingdom. 
The first thing they do should be to go to work for this end, 
to save sinners. 

11. I am to show how young converts should be treated by 
the church. 

1. Old professors ought to be able to give young converts a 
great deal of instruction, and they ought to give it. The truth 
is, however, that the great body of professors in the churches 
do not know how to give good instruction to young converts, 



INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 403 

and if they attempt to give them instruction, give only that 
which is false. The church ought to be able to teach her 
children ; and when she receives them, she ought to be as 
busy in training them to act, as mothers are in teaching their 
little children such things as they will need to know and do 
hereafter. But this is far enough from being the case gen- 
erally. And we can never expect to see young converts ha- 
bitually taking right hold of duty, and going straight forward 
without declension and backsliding, until young converts 
shall be intelligently trained by the church. 

2. Young converts should not be kept back behind the rest 
of the church. How often is it found that the old professor 
will keep the young converts back behind the rest of the 
church, and prevent them from taking any active part in re- 
ligion, for fear they should become spiritually proud. Young 
converts in such churches are rarely or never called on to 
take a part in meetings, or set to any active duty, or the like, 
.for fear they should become lifted up with spiritual pride. 
Thus the church become the modest keepers of their humihty, 
and teach them to file in behind the old, stiff, dry, cold mem- 
bers and elders, for fear that if they are allowed to do any- 
thing for Christ, it will make them proud. Whereas, the 
very way to make young converts humble and keep them so, 
is to put them to their work and keep them there. That is 
"the way to keep God with them, and as long as God is with 
them, He will take care of their humihty. Keep them con- 
stantly engaged in religion, and then the Spirit of God will 
dwell with them, and then they will be kept humble by the 
most effectual process. But if young converts are left to fall 
in behind the old professors, where they never can do any- 
thing, they will never know what spirit they are of, and this 
is the very way to run them into danger of the worst species 
of spiritual pride. 

3. They should be watched over by the church, and 
warned of their dangers, just as a tender mother watches 
over her young children. Young converts do not know at all 
the dangers by which they are surrounded. The devices of 
the devil, the temptations of the world, the power of their 
own passions and habits, and the thousand forms of danger 
they do not know ; and if not properly watched and warned, 
they will run right into danger. See that mother watching 
her little child. Does she let it put its little hand in the can- 
dle, or allow it to creep where it will fall, because its own 
blindness and ignorance does not prevent it from desiring to 
do so ? The church should watch over and care for her 



404 INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 

young children, just as mothers watch their little children in 
this great city, for fear the carts may run over them, or they 
may stray away and be lost ; or as they watch them while 
growing up, for fear they may be drawn into the wlairlpools 
of iniquity. The church should watch over all the interests 
of her young members, know where they are, and what are 
their habits, temptations, dangers, privileges, state of religion 
in their hearts, spirit of prayer. Look at that anxious moth- 
er, when she sees paleness gather round the little brow of her 
child. " What is the matter with you, my child ? Have you 
eaten something improper ? Have you taken cold ? What 
ails you ? " Oh, how different it is with the children of the 
church, the lambs that the Saviour has committed to the care 
of his churches. Alas ! instead of restraining her children, 
and taking care of them, the church lets them go anywhere, 
and look out for themselves. What should we say of a 
mother who should knowingly let her little child totter along 
to the edge of a precipice ? Should we not say she was 
horribly guilty for doing so, and that if the child should fall 
and be killed, its blood would rest on the mother's head ? 
What then is the guilt of the clmrch, in knowingly neglecting 
her young converts ? I have known churches where young 
converts were first totally neglected, and regarded with sus- 
picion and jealousy ; nobody went near them to strengthen 
or encourage or counsel them ; nothing was done to lead? 
them to usefulness, to teach them what to do, or how to do it, 
or open to them a field of labor. And then — what then ? 
Why, when they find that young converts cannot stand every- 
thing, and find them growing cold and backward under their 
own treatment, they just turn round and abuse them because 
they did not hold out. 

4. Be tender in reproving them. When Christians find it 
necessary to reprove young converts, they should be ex- 
ceedingly careful of their manner in doing it. Young con- 
verts should be faithfully watched over by the elder members 
of the church, and when they begin to lose ground, or to 
turn aside, they should be promptly admonished, and if 
necessary, reproved. But to do it in a wrong manner is 
worse than not to do it. It is sometimes done in a manner 
that is abrupt, harsh, coarse, and apparently censorious, 
more like scolding than like brotherly admonition. Such a 
manner, instead of inspiring confidence, or leading to refor- 
mation, is just calculated to harden the heart of the young 
convert, and confirm him in his wrong courses, while at 
the same time it closes his mind against the influence of 



INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 405 

such censorious guardians. The heart of a young convert 
is tender, and easily grieved, and sometimes a single un- 
kind look will set him into such a state of mind as will fas- 
ten his errors upon him and make him grow worse and 
worse. 

You who are parents know how important it is when you 
reprove your children that they should see that you do it 
from the best of motives, for their benefit, because you wish 
them to be good, and not because you are angry. Otherwise 
they will soon come to regard you as a tyrant, rather than a 
friend. Just so with young converts. Kindness and tender- 
ness, even in reproof, will win their confidence, and attach 
them to you, and give an influence to your brotherly in- 
structions and counsels, so that you can mould them into 
finished Christians. Instead of this, if you are severe and 
critical in your manner, that is the way to make them think 
you wish to lord it over them. Many persons, under pre- 
tence of being faithful, as they call it, often hurt young con- 
verts in such a severe and overbearing manner as to drive 
them away, or perhaps crush them into despondency and 
apathy. Young converts have but little experience, and are 
easily thrown down. They are just like a little child when it 
first begins to walk. You see it tottering along, and there it 
stumbles over a straw. You see the mother take up every- 
thing from the floor when her little one is going to try to 
walk. Just so with young converts. The church ought to 
take up every stumbling block, and treat them in such a way 
as to make them see that if they are reproved, Christ is in it, 
and then they will receive it as it is meant, and it will do 
them good. 

5. Kindly point out things that are faulty in tlie young convert 
which he does not see. He is but a child, and knows but lit- 
tle about religion, and will of course have a great many things 
that he needs to learn, and a great many that he ought to 
mend. Whatever there is that is wrong in spirit, or unlovely 
in his deportment, or uncultivated in manner, that will impede 
his usefulness or impair his influence as a Christian, ought to 
be kindly pointed out and corrected. To do this in the right 
way, however, requires great wisdom. Christians ought to 
make it a subject of much prayer and reflection, that they may 
do it right, so as not to do more hurt than good. If you re- 
buke him merely for the things that he did not see, or did not 
know to be improper, it will grieve and disgust him. Such 
instruction should be carefully timed ; often it is well to take 
the opportunity after you have been praying together, or after 



406 INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 

a kind conversation on religious subjects, calculated to make 
liim feel that you love him, and seek his good, and earnestly 
desire to promote his sanctification, his usefulness, and his 
happiness. Then a mere hint will often do the work. Just 
suggest that " Such a thing in your prayer" or "your conduct 
so and so, did not strike me pleasantly. Had you not better 
think of it, and perhaps you will judge better to avoid the same 
thing again." Do it right, and you will help and do him good. 
Do it wrong and you will do ten times more hurt than good. 
Often young converts will err, through ignorance ; their judg- 
ment is unripe, and they need time to think and make up an 
enlightened judgment, on some point that at first appears to 
them doubtful. In such cases the church should treat them 
with great kindness and forbearance. Should kindly instruct 
them and not denounce them at once for not seeing, at first, 
what perhaps they did not themselves understand, for years 
after they were converted. 

6. Do not speak of the faults of young converts, behind their 
backs. This is quite too common among old professors, and 
by and by they hear of it ; and what an influence it must have 
to destroy the confidence of young converts in their elder 
brethren, to grieve their hearts and discourage them, and per- 
haps drive them away from the good influence of the church. 

III. I am to mention some of the evils of defective instruc- 
tion to young converts. 

1. If not fully instructed, they never will be fully grounded 
in right principles. If they have right fundamental principles, 
this will lead them to adopt a right course of conduct in all 
particular cases. In forming a Christian character, a great 
deal depends on establishing those fundamental principles 
which are correct on all subjects. If you look at the Bible 
you will see there, that God teaches right principles which we 
can carry out in detail in right conduct. If the education of 
young converts is defective, either in kind or degree, you will 
see it in their character all their lives. This is the philosophi- 
cal result, just what might be expected, and must be always 
so. It could be shown, if I had time, that almost all the 
practical errors that have prevailed in the church, are the na- 
tural results of certain false dogmas, which have been taught 
to young converts, and which they have been made to swal- 
low as the truth of God, at a time when they were so igno- 
rant as not to know any better. 

2. If the instruction given to young converts is not correct 
and full, they will not grow in grace, but their religion will 
dwindle away and decay. Their course instead of being like 



INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 407 

the path of the just, growing brighter and brighter to the per- 
fect day, will grow dimmer and dimmer, and decay and finally 
perhaps go out in darkness. Wherever you see young con- 
verts let their religion taper off till it comes to nothing, you 
may understand that it is the proper result of defective in- 
struction. The philosophical result of teaching young converts 
the truth, and the whole truth, is that they grow stronger and 
stronger. Truth is the food for the mind — it is what gives 
the mind strength. And where religious character grows fee- 
ble, rely upon it, in nine cases out of ten it is owing to their 
being neglected, or falsely instructed, when they were young 
converts. 

3. They will be left justly in doubt whether they are Chris- 
tians. If their early instruction is false, or defective, there 
will be so much inconsistency in their lives, and so little real 
evidence of real piety, that they themselves will finally doubt 
whether they have any. Probably they will live and die in 
doubt. You cannot make a little evidence go a great way. 
If they do not see clearly they will not live consistently, if 
they do not live consistently they can have but little evidence, 
and if they have not evidence they must doubt, or live in pre- 
sumption. 

4. If young converts are rightly instructed and trained, it 
will generally be seen that they will take the right side on all 
great subjects that come before the church. Subjects are con- 
tinually coming up before the churches, on which they have 
to take ground, and on many of them there is. often no little 
difficulty to make all the church take right ground. Take the 
subject of Tracts, or Missions, or Sabbath schools, or Tem- 
perance, for instance, and what cavils and objections, and re- 
sistance, and opposition, have been encountered from mem- 
bers of the church in different places. Go through the 
churches, and where you find young converts have been well 
taught, you never find them making difficulty, or raising ob- 
jections, or putting forth cavils. ' I do not hesitate to charge 
it upon pastors and older members of churches, that there are 
so many who have to be dragged up to the right ground on all 
such subjects. If they had grounded them well in the prin- 
ciples of the Gospel at the outset, when they were first con- 
verted, they would have seen the application of their principles 
to all these things. It is curious to see, and I have had great 
opportunity to see, how ready young converts are to take 
right ground on any subject that may be proposed. See what 
they are willing to do for the education of ministers, for mis- 
sions, for moral reform, for the slaves. If the great body of 



408 INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 

young converts from the late revivals had been well grounded 
in Gospel principles, you would have found in theni, through- 
out the church, but one heart and one soul in regard to every 
question of duty that occurs. Let their early education be 
right, and you have got a body of Christians that you can 
depend on. If it had been general in the church, oh, how 
much more strength there would have been in all her great 
movements for the salvation of the world. 

5. If young converts are not well instructed they will inevi- 
tably backslide. If their instruction is defective, they will 
probably live in such a way as to disgrace religion. The truth, 
kept steadily before the mind of a young convert, in proper 
proportions, has a natural tendency to make him grow up into 
the fulness of the stature of a perfect man in Christ Jesus. If 
any one point is made too prominent in the instruction given, 
there will probably be just that disproportion in his charac- 
ter. If he is fully instructed on some points and not in 
others, you will find a corresponding defect in his life and 
character. 

If the instruction of young converts is greatly defective, 
they will press on in religion no further than they are strongly 
propelled by the emotions of their first conversion. As soon 
as that is spent they will come to a stand, and then they will 
decline and backslide. And ever after you will find that they 
will go forward only when aroused by some powerful excite- 
ment. These are your periodical Christians, that are so apt 
to wake up in, a time of revival, and bluster about as if they 
had the zeal of an angel, a few days, and then die away as 
dead and cold as a northern winter. Oh how desirable, how 
infinitely important it is, that young converts should be so 
taught, that their religion will not depend on impulses and 
excitements, but that they will go steadily onward in the 
Christian course, advancing from strength to strength, giving 
forth a clear and safe and steady light all around. 

REMARKS. 

1. The church is verily guilty for her past neglect, in regard 
to the instruction of young converts. 

Instead of bringing up their young converts to be working 
Christians, the churches have generally acted as if they did 
not know how to employ young converts, or what use to 
make of them. They have acted like a mother, who has a 
great family of daughters, and knows nothing how to set 
them to work, and so suffers them to grow up idle and un- 



INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 409 

taught, useless and despised, and to be the easy prey of every 
designing villain. 

If the church had only done her duty in training up young 
converts to work, and labor for Christ, the world would have 
been converted long ago. But instead of this, how many 
churches even oppose young converts, when they attempt to 
set themselves at work for Christ. Multitudes of old profes- 
sors look with suspicion upon every movement of young con- 
verts, and talk against thgm, and say, " They are too forward, 
they ought not to put themselves forward, but wait for those 
who are older." There is waiting again. Instead of bidding 
young converts " God speed," and cheering them on when 
they take hold with warm hearts and strong hands, very often 
they hinder them and perhaps put them down. How often 
have young converts been stopped from going forward, and 
turned in behind a formal, lazy, inefficient church, till their 
spirit is crushed, and their zeal extinguished, and after a few 
ineffectual struggles to throw off the cords, they conclude to 
sit down with the rest and WAIT. In many places, young 
converts cannot even attempt to hold a prayer meeting by 
themselves, but what the pastor, or some of the deacons, re- 
buke them for being so forward, and charge them with spir- 
itual pride. " Oh, ho ! you are young converts, are you? and so 
you want to get together and call all the neighbors together 
to look at you, because you are young converts." You had 
better turn preachers at once. A celebrated Doctor of Divin- 
ity in New England boasted at a public table of his success in 
keeping all his converts still. He had great difficulty, he said, 
for they were in a terrible fever to do something, to talk, or 
pray, or get up meetings, but by the greatest vigilance he had 
kept it all down, and now his church was just as quiet as it 
was before the revival. Wonderful achievement for a minis- 
ter of Jesus Christ ! Was that what the blessed Saviour 
meant when he told Peter, " Feed my lambs ? " 

2. Young converts should be trained to labor, just as care- 
fully as young recruits in an army are trained for war. 

Suppose a captain in the army should get his company 
enlisted, and then take no more pains to teach and train and 
discipline them, than is taken by many pastors to train and 
lead forward their young converts. Why, the enemy would 
laugh at such an army. Call them soldiers ! Why, as to any 
effective service, they are in a mere state of babyhood, they 
know nothing what to do or how to do it, and if you bring 
them up to the CHAKGE, where are they ? Such an army 
would resemble the clmrch that does not train her young 
18 



410 INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 

converts. Instead of being trained to stand shoulder to 
shoulder in the onset, they feel no practical confidence in 
their leaders, no confidence in their neighbors, no confidence 
in themselves, and they scatter at the first shock of battle. 
Look at the church now. Ministers are not agreed as to 
what shall be done, and many of them will turn and fight 
back against their brethren, quarrelling about New Measures, 
or the Act and Testimony, or something. And as to the 
members, they cannot feel confidence when they see their 
leaders so divided. And then if they attempt to do anything — 
Alas ! alas ! what ignorance, what awkwardness, what discord, 
what weakness, what miserable work they make of it. And 
so it must continue, until the church shall train up young 
converts to be be intelligent, single-hearted, self-denying, 
working Christians. Here is an enterprise now going on in 
this city, which I rejoice to see. I mean the Tract enter- 
prise — a blessed work. And the plan is to train up a body 
of devoted Christians to do — what? — why to do what aU 
the church ought to have been trained to do long ago, to 
know how to pray, and how to converse with people about 
their soul's salvation, and how to attend anxious meetings, 
and how to deal with inquirers, and how to SAVE SOULS. 

3. The church has entirely mistaken the manner in which 
she is to be sanctified. 

The experiment has been carried on long enough, of trying 
to sanctify the church, without finding anything for them to 
do* But holiness consists in obeying God. And sanctifica- 
tion, as a process, means obeying him more and more per- 
fectly. And the way to promote it in the church, is to give 
every one something to do. Look at these great churches, 
where they have 500 or 700 members, and get a minister to 
feed them from Sabbath to Sabbath, while there are so many 
of them together that the greater part have nothing at all 
to do, are never trained to make any direct efforts for the 
salvation of souls. And in that way they are expecting to be 
sanctified and prepared for heaven. They never will be sanc- 
tified so. That is not the way God has appointed. Jesus 
Christ has made his people co-workers with him in saving 
sinners, for this very reason, because sanctification consists in 
doing those things which are required to promote this work. 
This is one reason why he has not employed angels in the 
work, or carried it on by direct revelation of truth to the 
minds of men. It is because it is necessary as a means of 
sanctification, that the church should sympathize with Christ 
in his feelings and his labors for the conversion of sinners. 



INSTRUCTION OF YOUNG CONVERTS. 411 

And in this way the entire church must move, before the 
world will be converted. When the day comes, that the whole 
church shall realize that they are here on earth as a body of 
missionaries, and shall live and labor accordingly, then will 
the day of man's redemption draw nigh. 

Christian ! if you cannot go abroad to labor, why are you 
not a missionary in your own family ? If you are too feeble 
even to leave your room, be a missionary there in your bed- 
chamber. How many unconverted servants have you in your 
house ? Call in your unconverted servants, and your uncon- 
verted children, and be a missionary to them. Think of your 
physician, perhaps, who is laying himself out to save your 
body, while he is losing his own soul, and you receive his 
kindness and never make him the greatest return in your 
power. 

It is necessary that the church should take hold of her 
young converts at the outset, and set them to work, and set 
them to work right. The hope of the church is in the young 
converts. 

4. We see what a responsibility rests on ministers, and 
elders, and all who have opportunity to assist in training 
young converts. How distressing is the picture which often 
forces itself upon the mind, where multitudes are converted, 
and yet so little pains taken with the young converts, that in 
a single year you cannot tell the young converts from the 
rest of the church. And then to see the old church mem- 
bers turn round and complain of these young converts, and 
perhaps slander them, when in truth these old professors 
themselves are most to blame. Oh, it is too bad. This reac- 
tion that people talk so much about after a revival, (as if re- 
action was the necessary effect of a revival,) would never 
come, young converts never would backslide as they do, if 
the church were prompt and faithful in attending to their 
instruction. If they are truly converted, they can be made 
thorough and energetic Christians. And if they are not such, 
Jesus Christ will require it at the hands of the church. 



LECTTJKE XXI. 



-BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 



Text.— The backslider in heart shall be filled with his own ways.— Pbov. xiv. 14. 

I cannot conclude this course of lectures, without warning 
converts against backsliding. In discussing this subject, I 
will state, 

I. What backsliding in heart is not. 
IT. What backsliding in heart is. 
m. What are evidences of backsliding in heart. 
IV. Show what are consequences of backsliding in heart. 
V. How to recover from this state. 
I. What backsliding in heart is not. 

I. It does not consist in the subsidence of highly excited 
religious emotions. The subsidence of religious feeling may 
be an evidence of a backslidden heart, but it does not consist 
in the cooling off of religious feeling. 

II. What backsliding in heart is. 

1. It consists in taking back that consecration to God and 
his service, that constitutes true conversion. 

2. It is the leaving, by a Christian, of his first love. 

3. It consists in the Christian's withdrawing himself from 
that state of entire and universal devotion to God, which con- 
stitutes true religion, and coming again under the control of a 
self-pleasing spirit. 

4. The text implies that there may be a backslidden heart, 
when the form of religion and obedience to God are main- 
tained. As we know from consciousness that men perform 
the same, or similar acts from widely different, and often from 
opposite motives, we are certain that men may keep up all the 
outward forms and appearances of religion, when in fact, they 
are backslidden in heart. There is no doubt, that the most 
intense selfishness often takes on a religious type, and there 
are many considerations, that might lead a backslider in heart, 
to keep up the forms, while he had lost the power of godli- 
ness in his soul. 

m. What are evidences of a backslidden heart. 
1. Manifest formality in religious exercises. A stereotyped, 
(412) 



BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 413 

formal way of saying and doing things, that is clearly the re- 
sult of habit, rather than the outgushing of the religious life. 
This formality will be emotionless and cold as an iceberg, and 
will evince a total want of earnestness in the performance 
of religious duty. In prayer and in religous exercises the 
backslider in heart will pray or praise, or confess, or give 
thanks with his lips, so that all can hear him, perhaps, but in 
such a way that no one ean/<?^ him. Such a formality would 
be impossible where there existed a present, living faith and 
love, and religious zeal. 

2. A want of religious enjoyment is evidence of a back- 
slidden heart. We always enjoy the saying and doing of 
those things that please those whom we most love ; further- 
more, when the heart is not backslidden, communion with God 
is kept up, and therefore all religious duties are not only per- 
formed with pleasure, but the communion with God involved 
in them, is a source of rich and continual enjoyment. If we 
do not enjoy the service of God, it is because we do not truly 
serve him. If we love Him supremely, it is impossible that 
we should not enjoy His service at every step. Always re- 
member then, whenever you lose your religious enjoyment, or 
the enjoyment of serving God, you may know that you are 
not serving Him right. 

3. Religious bondage is another evidence of a backslidden 
heart. God has no slaves. He does not accept the service 
of bondmen, who serve him because they must. He accepts 
none but a love service. A backslider in heart, finds his re- 
ligious duties a burden to him. He has promised to serve 
the Lord. He dare not wholly break off from the form of 
service, and he tries to be dutiful, while he has no heart in 
prayer, in praise, in worship, in closet duties, or in any of 
those exercises which are so spontaneous and delightful, 
where there is true love to God.' The backslider in heart is 
often like a dutiful, but unloving wife. She tries to do her duty 
to her husband, but fails utterly because she does not love him. 
Her painstaking to please her husband is constrained, not the 
spontaneous outburst of a loving heart, and her relation, and 
her duties, become the burden of her life. She goes about 
complaining of the weight of care that is upon her, and will 
not be likely to advise young ladies to marry. She is com- 
mitted for life, and must therefore perform the duties of mar- 
ried life, but oh, it is such a bondage ! Just so with religious 
bondage. The professor must perform his duty. He drags 
painfully about it, and you will hear him naturally sing back- 
slider's hymns, 



414 BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 

" Reason I hear, her counsels weigh, 
And all her words approve ; 
And yet I find it hard to obey, 
And harder still, to love." 

4. An ungoverned temper. 

"While the heart is full of love, the temper will naturally be 
chastened and sweet, or at any rate, the will will keep it un- 
der, and not suffer it to break out in outrageous abuse, or if 
at any time, it should so far escape from the control of the 
will as to break loose in hateful words, it will soon be brought 
under, and by no means suffered to take the control and 
manifest itself to the annoyance of others. Especially will a 
loving heart confess and break down, if at any time bad tem- 
per gets the control. Wherever, therefore, there is an irrita- 
ble, uncontrolled temper allowed to manifest itself to those 
around one, you may know there is a backslidden heart. 

5. A spirit of uncharitableness is evidence of a backslidden 
heart. By this, I mean a want of that disposition that puts 
the best construction upon every one's conduct that can be 
reasonable — a want of confidence in the good intentions and 
professions of others. We naturally credit the good profes- 
sions of those whom we love. We naturally attribute to 
them right motives, and put the best allowable construction 
upon their words and deeds. Where there is a want of this 
there is evidence conclusive of a backslidden or unloving 
heart. 

6. A censorious spirit is conclusive evidence of a backslid- 
den heart. This is a spirit of fault-finding, of impugning the 
motives of others, when their conduct admits of a charitable 
construction. It is a disposition to fasten blame upon others, 
and judge them harshly. It is a spirit of distrust of Chris- 
tian character and professions. It is a state of mind that re- 
veals itself in harsh judgments, harsh sayings, and the mani- 
festation of uncomfortable feelings toward individuals. This 
state of mind is entirely incompatible with a loving heart, 
and wherever a censorious spirit is manifested by a profes- 
sor of religion, you may know there is a backslidden heart. 

7. A want of interest in God's word, is also an evidence 
of a backslidden heart. Perhaps nothing more conclusively 
proves that a professor has a backslidden heart, than his los- 
ing his interest in the Bible. While the heart is full of love, 
no book in the world is so precious as the Bible. But when 
the love is gone, the Bible becomes not only uninteresting but 
often repulsive. There is no faith to accept its promises, but 



BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 415 

conviction enough left to dread its threatenings. But in gen- 
eral the backslider in heart is apathetic as to the Bible. He 
does not read it much, and when he does read it, he has not 
interest enough to understand it. Its pages become dark 
and uninteresting, and therefore it is neglected. 

8. A -want of interest in secret prayer is also an evidence 
of a backslidden heart. 

Young Christian ! If you find yourself losing your interest 
in the Bible and in secret prayer, stop short, return to God, 
and give yourself no rest, till you enjoy the light of his coun- 
tenance. If you feel disinclined to pray, or read your Bible, 
if when you pray and read your Bible, you have no heart in 
it, no enjoyment, if you are inclined to make your secret de- 
votions short, or, are easily induced to neglect them, if your 
thoughts, affections and emotions wander, and your closet 
duties become a burden, you may know that you are a back- 
slider in heart, and your first business is, to break down, and 
see that your love and zeal are renewed. 

9. A want of interest in the conversion of souls and in ef- 
forts to promote revivals of religion. This of course reveals 
a backslidden heart. There is nothing in which a loving 
heart takes more interest than in the conversion of souls in 
revivals of religion, and in efforts to promote them. 

10. A want of interest in published accounts or narratives 
of revivals of religion, is also an evidence of a backslidden 
heart. While one retains his interest in the conversion of 
souls, and in revivals of religion he will, of course, be interest- 
ed in all accounts of revivals of religion anywhere. If you 
find yourself, therefore, disinclined to read such accounts, or 
find yourself not interested in them, take it for granted that 
you are backslidden in heart. 

11. The same is true of missions, and missionary work and 
operations. If you lose your interest in' the work, and in the 
conversion of the heathen, and do not delight to read and 
hear of the success of missions, you may know that you are 
backslidden in heart. 

12. The loss of interest in benevolent enterprises generally 
is an evidence of a backslidden heart. I say the loss of in- 
terest, for surely, if you were ever converted to Christ, you 
have had an interest in all benevolent enterprises that came 
within your knowledge. Beligion consists in disinterested 
benevolence. Of course, a converted soul takes the deepest 
interest in all benevolent efforts to reform and save mankind. 
In good government, in Christian education, in the cause of 
temperance, in the abolition of slavery, in provisions for the 



416 BACKSLIDER IX HEART. 

poor, and in short, in every good word and work, just in pro- 
portion as you have lost your interest in these, you have evi- 
dence that you are backslidden in heart. 

13. The loss of interest in truly spiritual conversation is 
another evidence of a backslidden heart. " Out of the abun- 
dance of the heart the mouth speaketh." This our Lord 
Jesus Christ" announced as a law of our nature. No conversa- 
tion is so sweet to a truly loving heart, as that which relates 
to Christ, and to our living Christian experience. If you find 
yourself losing interest in conversing of heart religion, and 
of the various and wonderful experiences of Christians, if 
you ever knew what the true love of God is, you have fallen 
from it, and are a backslider in heart. 

14. A loss of interest in the conversation and society of 
highly spiritual people, is an evidence of a backslidden heart. 
"We take the greatest delight in the society of those who are 
most interested in the things that are most dear to us. Hence, 
a loving Christian heart will always seek the society of those 
who are most spiritually-minded, and whose conversation is 
most evangelical and spiritual. If you find yourself wanting 
in this respect, know for certain that you are backslidden in 
heart. 

15. The loss of interest in the question of sanctification is 
an evidence of a backslidden heart. I say again, the loss of 
interest, for, if you ever truly knew the love of God, you must 
have had a great interest in the question of entire consecra- 
tion to God, or of entire sanctification. If you are a Chris- 
tian, you have felt that sin was an abomination to your soul. 
You have had inexpressible longings to be rid of it forever, 
and everything that could throw light upon that question of 
agonizing importance, was most intensely interesting to you. 
If this question has been dismissed, and you no longer take 
an interest in it, it is because you are backslidden in heart. 

16. The loss of interest in those newly converted, is also 
an evidence of a backslidden heart. The Psalmist says, " All 
who fear thee will be glad when they see me, because I have 
hoped in thy word." This he puts into the mouth of a con- 
vert, and who does not know th&t this is true ? Why, there 
is joy in the presence of the angels of God, over one sinner 
that repenteth, and is there not joy among the saints on 
earth, over those that come to Christ, and are as babes newly 
born into the kingdom of heaven. Show me a professor of 
religion, who does not manifest an absorbing interest in con- 
verts to Christ, and I will show you a backslider in heart, and 
a hypocrite ; he professes religion, and has none. 



BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 417 

17. An uncharitable state of mind in regard to professed 
converts, is also an evidence of a backslidden heart. Charity 
or love, hopeth all things, and believeth all things, and is very 
ready to judge kindly and favorably of those who profess to 
be converted to Christ, will naturally watch over them with 
interest, pray for them, instruct them, and have as much con- 
fidence in them as it is reasonable to have. A disposition, 
therefore, to pick at, criticise, and censure them, is an evi- 
dence of a backslidden heart. 

18. The want of the spirit of prayer is evidence of a back- 
slidden heart. While the love of Christ remains fresh in the 
soul, the indwelling spirit of Christ will reveal himself as the 
spirit of grace and supplication. He will beget strong desires 
in the soul for the salvation of sinners and the sanctification 
of saints. He will often make intercessions in them, with 
great longings, strong crying and tears, and with groanings 
that cannot be uttered in words, for those things that are ac- 
cording to the will of God, or to express it in Scripture lan- 
guage, according to Paul, Romans viii. 26 and 27, " Likewise 
the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities, for we know not what 
we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit itself, maketh 
intercession for us, with groanings which cannot be uttered. 
And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth the mind of the 
Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints, accord- 
ing to the will of God." If the spirit of prayer departs, it is 
a sure indication of a backslidden heart, for while the first 
love of a Christian continues he is sure to be drawn by the 
Holy Spirit to wrestle much in prayer. 

19. A backslidden heart often reveals itself by the manner 
in which people pray. For example, praying as if one was 
in a state of self-condemnation, or very much like a convicted 
sinner, is an evidence of a backslidden heart, Such an one 
will reveal the fact, that he is not at peace with God. His 
confessions and self-accusations will show to others what per- 
haps he does not well understand himself. His manner of 
praying will reveal the fact, that he has not communion with 
God ; that instead of being filled with faith and love, he is 
more or less convicted of sin, and conscious that he is not in 
a state of acceptance with God. He will naturally pray more 
like a convicted sinner, than like a Christian. It will be seen 
by his prayer that he is not in a state of Christian liberty — 
that he is having a 7th of Romans experience, instead of that 
which is described in the 8 th of Romans. 

20. A backslidden heart will further reveal itself in praying 
almost exclusively for self, and for those friends that are re- 

18* 



418 BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 

garded as parts of self. It is often very striking and even 
shocking to attend a backslider's prayer meeting, and I am 
very sorry to say that many prayer meetings of the church 
are little else. Their prayers are timid and hesitating, and 
reveal the fact that they have little or no faith. Instead of 
surrounding the throne of grace and pouring their hearts out 
for a blessing on those around them, they have to be urged up 
to duty, to take up their cross. Their hearts do not, will not, 
spontaneously gush out to God in prayer. They have very 
little concern for others, and when they do, as they say, take 
up their cross and do their duty, and pretend to lead in 
prayer, it will be observed that they pray just like a company 
of convicted sinners, almost altogether for themselves. They 
will pray for that, which, should they obtain it, would be re- 
ligion, just as a convicted sinner would pray for a new heart, 
and praying for religion as they do, manifests that they have 
none, in their present state of mind. Ask them to pray for 
the conversion of sinners, and they will either wholly forget 
it, or just mention them in such a way as will show that they 
have no heart to pray for them. I have known professed 
Christian parents to get into such a state that they had no 
heart to pray for the conversion of their own children, even 
when those children were under conviction. They would 
keep up family prayer, and attend a weekly prayer meeting, 
and never get out of the old rut, of praying round and round 
for themselves. A few years since, I was laboring in a revival 
in a Presbyterian church. At the close of the evening ser- 
mon, I found that the daughter of one of the elders of the 
church, was in great distress of mind. I observed her con- 
victions were very deep. We had been holding a meeting 
with inquirers in the vestry, and I had just dismissed the in- 
quirers, when this young lady, came to me in great agitation, 
and begged me to pray for her. The people had mostly gone, 
except a few that were waiting in the body of the church for 
those friends to be dismissed that had attended the meeting 
of inquiry. I called the father of this young lady into the 
vestry that he might see the very anxious state of his daugh- 
ter's mind. After a short personal conversation with her in 
the presence of her father, I called on him to pray for her, 
and said that I would follow him, and urged her to give her 
heart to Christ. We all knelt, and he went through with his 
grayer, kneeling by the side of his sobbing daughter, without 
ever mentioning her case. His prayer revealed that he had 
no more religion than she had, and that he was very much in 
her state of mind — under an awful sense of condemnation. 



BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 419 

He had kept up the appearance of religion. As an elder of 
the church, he was obliged to keep up appearances. He had 
gone round and round upon the tread-mill of his duties, 
while his heart was utterly backslidden. It is often almost 
nauseating to attend a prayer meeting of the backslidden in 
heart. They will go round, round, one after the other, in 
reality praying for their own conversion. They do not so ex- 
press it, but that is the real import of their prayer. They 
could not render it more evident that they are backsliders 
in heart, if they were every one to take his oath of it. 

21. Absence from stated prayer meetings for slight reasons 
is a sure indication of a backslidden heart. No meeting is 
more interesting to a wakeful Christian than the prayer meet- 
ing, and while they have any heart to pray, they will not be 
absent from prayer meeting unless prevented from attending 
by the providence of God. If a call from a friend at the 
hour of meeting, can prevent their attendance, unless the call 
be made under very peculiar circumstances, it is strong evi- 
dence that they do not wish to attend, and hence, that they 
are backsliders in heart. A call at such a time would not 
prevent their attending a wedding, a party, a pic-nic, or an 
amusing lecture. The fact is, it is hypocrisy for them to pre- 
tend that they really want to go, while they can be kept away 
for slight reasons. If it were any place where they much de- 
sired to go, they would excuse themselves, and say, " I was 
just going to ride," or, "I was just going to such a place." 
and away they would go. 

22. The same is true of the neglect of family prayer, for 
slight reasons. 

While the heart is engaged in religion, Christians will 
not readily omit family devotions, and whenever they are 
ready to find an excuse for the omission, it is a sure evidence 
that they are backslidden in heart. 

23. When secret prayer is regarded more as a duty than as 
a privilege, it is because the heart is backslidden. It has al- 
ways appeared to me almost ridiculous, to hear Christians 
speak of prayer as a duty. It is one of the greatest of earthly 
privileges. What should we think of a child's coming to its 
parent for its dinner, not because it was hungry, but as a 
duty. How would it strike us to hear a beggar speak of the 
duty of asking alms of us. It is an infinite privilege to be 
allowed to come to God, and ask for the supply of all our 
wants. But to pray because we must, rather than be- 
cause we may, seems unnatural. To ask for what we 
want, and because we want it, and because God has en- 



420 BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 

couraged us to ask, and has promised to answer our request, 
is natural and reasonable. But to pray as a duty and as if 
we were obliging God by our prayer, is quite ridiculous, and 
is a certain indication of a backslidden heart. 

24. Pleading for worldly amusements, is also an indication 
of a backslidden heart. The most grateful amusements pos- 
sible, to a truly spiritual mind, are those engagements that 
bring the soul into the most direct communion with God. 
While the heart is full of love and faith, an hour, or an even- 
ing spent alone, in communion with God, is more delightful 
than all the amusements which the world can offer. A loving 
heart is jealous of everything that will break up or interfere 
with its communion with God. For mere worldly amusements 
it has no relish. When the soul does not find more delight 
in God than in all worldly things, the heart is sadly back- 
slidden. 

25. Spiritual blindness is another evidence of a backslidden 
heart. While the eye is single the whole body will be full of 
spiritual light, but if the eye be evil, (which is a backslidden 
heart) the whole body will be full of darkness. 

Spiritual blindness reveals itself in a want of interest in 
God's word, and in religious truth generally. It will also 
manifest a want of spiritual discrimination, and will be easily 
imposed upon by the insinuations of Satan. A backslidden 
heart will lead to the adoption of lax principles of morality. 
It does not discern the spirituality of God's law, and of His 
requirements generally. When this spiritual blindness is 
manifest it is a sure indication that the heart is back- 
slidden. 

26. Beligious apathy, with worldly wakefulness and sensi- 
bility, is a sure indication of a backslidden heart. We some- 
times see persons who feel deeply and quickly on worldly 
subjects, but who cannot be made to feel deeply on religious 
subjects. This clearly indicates a backslidden state of 
mind. 

27. A self-indulgent spirit is a sure indication of a back- 
slidden heart. By self-indulgence, I mean a disposition to 
gratify the appetites, passions and propensities, " to fulfill the 
desires of the flesh and of the mind." 

This, in the Bible, is represented as a state of spiritual 
death. I am satisfied that the most common occasion of 
backsliding in heart, is to be found in the clamor for indul- 
gence of the various appetites and propensities. The appe- 
tite for food is frequently, and perhaps more frequently than 
any other, the occasion of backsliding. Few Christians, I 



BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 421 

fear, apprehend any danger in this direction. God's injunc- 
tion is, " Whether ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do 
all to the glory of God." Christians forget this, and eat 
and drink to please themselves — consult their appetites, in- 
stead of the laws of life and health. More persons are en- 
snared by their tables than the church is aware of. The 
table is a snare of death to multitudes that no man can num- 
ber. A great many people who avoid alcoholic drinks alto- 
gether, will indulge in tea and coffee, and even tobacco, and 
in food, both in quantity and quality that violates every law 
of health. They seem to have no other law, than that of ap- 
petite, and this they so deprave by abuse that, to indulge 
it, is to ruin body and soul together. Show me a gluttonous 
professor, and I will show you a backslider. 

28. A seared conscience is also an evidence of a backslidden 
heart. While the soul is wakeful and loving, the conscience 
is as tender as the apple of the eye. But when the heart is 
backslidden, the conscience is silent and seared, on many sub- 
jects. Such an one will tell you that he is not violating his 
conscience, in eating or drinking, or in self-indulgence of any 
kind. You will find a backslider has but little conscience. 
The same will be true in regard to sins of omission very 
generally. Multitudes of duties may be neglected and a seared 
conscience will remain silent Where conscience is not awake, 
the heart is surely backslidden. 

29. Loose moral principles are a sure indication of a back- 
slidden heart. A backslider in heart, will write letters on the 
Sabbath, engage in secular reading, and in much worldly 
conversation. In business, such an one will take little advan- 
tages, and play off business tricks, conform to the habits of 
worldly business men, in the transaction of business, will be 
guilty of deception and misrepresentation in making bargains, 
will demand exorbitant interest, and take advantage of the 
necessities of his fellow men. 

30. Prevalence of the fear of man, is an evidence of a 
backslidden heart While the heart is full of the love of God, 
God is feared, and not man. A desire for the applause of 
men is kept down, and it is enough for such an one to please 
God, whether men are pleased or displeased. But when the 
love of God is abated, " the fear of man, that bringeth a 
snare," gets possession of man. To please man rather than 
God, is then his aim. In such a state he will sooner offend 
God than man. 

31. A stickhshness about forms, ceremonies, and non-essen- 
tials, is evidence of a backslidden heart. A loving heart, is 



422 BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 

particular only about the substance and power of religion, and 
will not stickle about its forms. 

32. A captiousness about measures in promoting revivals 
of religion, is a sure evidence of a backslidden heart. Where 
the heart is fully set upon the conversion of sinners, and the 
sanctification of believers, it will naturally approach the sub- 
ject in the most direct manner, and by means in the highest 
degree calculated to accomplish the end. It will not object 
to, and stumble at, measures that are evidently blessed of 
God, but will exert its utmost sagacity in devising the 
most suitable means to accomplish the great end on which 
the heart is set. 

IV. Show what are consequences of backsliding in heart. 
The text says, that the backslider in heart shall be filled with 
his own ways. 

1. He shall be filled with his own works. But these are 
dead works, they are not works of faith and love, which are 
acceptable to God, but are the filthy rags of his own right- 
eousness. If they are performed as religious services, they 
are but loathsome hypocrisy, and an abomination to God, 
there is no heart in them, and to such a one, God says, " Who 
hath required this at your hands ?" " Ye are they that justify 
yourselves before men, but God knoweth your hearts ; for 
that which is highly esteemed among men, is an abomination 
in the sight of God." " I know you, that you have not the 
love of God in you." 

2. He shall be filled with his own feelings. Instead of that 
sweet peace and rest, and joy in the Holy Ghost, that he once 
experienced, he will find himself in a state of unrest, dissatis- 
fied with himself and everybody else, his feelings often painful, 
humiliating, and as unpleasant and unlovely, as can be well 
conceived. It is often very trying to live with a backslider. 
They are often peevish, censorious, and irritating, in all their 
ways. They have forsaken God, and in their feelings is more 
of hell than heaven. 

3. They will be filled with their own prejudices. Their 
willingness to know and do the truth has gone. They will 
very naturally commit themselves against any truth that bears 
hard upon their self-indulgent spirit. They will endeavor to 
justify themselves, will neither read nor hear that which will 
rebuke their backslidden state, and they will become deeply 
prejudiced against everyone that shall cross their path. If 
anyone reproves them, they account him as an enemy. They 
hedge themselves in, and shut their eyes against the light, 
stand on the defensive, and criticise everything that would 
search them out. 






BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 423 

4. A backslider in heart will be filled with his own enmi- 
ties. Such an one will almost surely lay up things against 
those with whom he has any business or other relations. 
He will chafe in almost every relation of life, will allow him- 
self to be vexed and angry, and get into such relations with 
some, and perhaps many persons, that he cannot pray for 
them honestly, and can hardly treat them with common civ- 
ility. This is an almost certain result of a backslidden heart. 

5. The backslider in heart will be full of his own mistakes. 
He is not walking with God. He has fallen out of the Divine 
order. He is not led by the Spirit, but is walking in spiritual 
darkness. In this state he is sure to fall into many and 
grievous mistakes, and may get entangled in such a way as to 
mar his happiness, and, perhaps, destroy his usefulness for 
life. Mistakes in business, mistakes in forming new relations 
in life, mistakes in using his time, his tongue, his money, his 
influence — all will go wrong with him as long as he remains 
in a backslidden state. 

6. The backslider in heart will be filled with liis own lust- 
ings. His appetites and passions, which had been kept under, 
have now resumed their control, and having been so long 
suppressed, they will seem to avenge themselves by becoming 
more clamorous and despotic than ever. The animal appe- 
tites and passions will burst forth, to the astonishment of the 
backslider, and ten to one, if he does not find himself more 
under their influence, and more enslaved by them than ever 
before. 

7. The backslider in heart will he filled with his own words. 
While in that state, he will not, and cannot, control his tongue. 
It will prove itself to be an unruly member, full of deadly poi- 
son, will set on fire the course of nature, and is itself set on fire 
of hell. By his words he will involve himself in many diffi- 
culties and perplexities, from which he can never extricate 
himself, until he comes back to God. 

8. He will be full of his own trials. Instead of keeping 
out of temptation, he will run right into temptation. He will 
bring upon himself multitudes of trials that he never would 
have had, had he not departed from God. He will complain 
of his trials, and yet constantly multiply them. A backslider 
feels his trials keenly, and, while he complains of being so 
tried by everything around him, he is constantly aggravating 
them, and being the author of them, he seems industrious to 
bring them upon himself, like an avalanche. 

9. The backslider in heart shall be full of his own follies. 
Having rejected the Divine guidance, he will evidently fall 



424 BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 

into the depths of his own foolishness. He will inevitably 
say and do multitudes of foolish and ridiculous things. Being 
a professor . of religion, these things will be all the more 
noticed, and of course bring him all the more into ridicule 
and contempt. A backslider is, indeed, the greatest fool in 
the world. Having experimental knowledge of the true way 
of life, he has the infinite folly to abandon it. Knowing the 
fountain of living water, he has forsaken it, and hewed out 
to himself cisterns — broken cisterns that can hold no water. 
Having been guilty of this infinite folly, the whole course of 
his backslidden life must be that of a fool, in the Bible sense 
of the term. 

10. The backslider in heart will be full of his own troubles. 
God is against him, and he is against himself. He is not at 
peace with God, with himself, with the church, or with the 
world. He has no inward rest. Conscience condemns him. 
God condemns him. All that know his state condemn him. 
"There is no peace to the wicked, saith my God." There is 
no position in time or space in which he can be at rest. 

11. The backslider in heart will be full of his own cares. 
He has turned back to selfishness. He counts himself and his 
possessions as his own. He has everything to care for. He 
will not hold himself and his possessions as belonging to God, 
and lay aside the responsibility of taking care of himself and 
all that he possesses. He does not, will not, cast his care upon 
the Lord, but undertakes to manage everything for himself, 
and in his own wisdom, and for his own ends. Consequently, 
his cares will be multiplied, and come upon him like a 
deluge. 

12. The backslider in heart will be full of his own perplexi- 
ties. Having forsaken God, having fallen out of his order, 
and into the darkness of his own folly, he will be filled with 
perplexities and doubts in regard to what course he shall pursue 
to accomplish his selfish ends. He is not walking with, but 
contrary to God. Hence, the providence of God will con- 
stantly cross his path, and baffle all his schemes. God will 
frown darkness upon his path, and take pains to confound his 
projects, and blow his schemes to the winds. 

13. The backslider in heart will be filled with his own anx- 
ieties. He will be anxious about himself, about his business, 
about his reputation, about everything. He has taken all 
these things out of the hands of God, and claims them and 
treats them as his own, and having faith in God no longer, 
and being unable to control events, he must of necessity be 
filled with anxiety with regard to the future. These anxieties 



BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 425 

are the inevitable result of his madness and folly in forsaking 
God. 

14. The backslider in heart will be filled with his own dis- 
appointments. Having forsaken God, and taken the attitude 
of self-will before him, God will inevitably disappoint him in 
pursuing his selfish ends. He will frame his ways to please 
himself, without consulting God. Of course God will frame 
his ways so as to disappoint him. Determined to have his 
own way, he will be greatly disappointed if his plans are frus- 
trated, and the certain course of events under the government 
of God must of course bring a series of disappointments 
upon subjects that have rebelled against him. 

15. The backslider in heart must be full of his own losses. 
He regards his possessions as his own, his time as his own, 
his influence as his own, his reputation as his own. The loss 
of any of these he accounts as his own loss. Having for- 
saken God, and being unable to control the events upon 
which the continuance of those things is conditioned, he will 
find himself suffering losses on every side. He loses his 
peace. He loses his property. He loses much of his time. 
He loses his Christian reputation. He loses his Christian in- 
fluence, and if he persists he loses his soul. 

16. The backslider in heart shall be full of his own crosses. 
All religious duty will be irksome, and, therefore, a cross to 
him. His state of mind will make multitudes of things crosses 
that in a Christian state of mind would have been pleasant in 
a high degree. Having lost all heart in religion, the perform- 
ance of all religious duties are crossing to his feelings. There 
is no help for him, unless he returns to God. The whole 
course of Divine providence will run across his path, and his 
whole life will be a series of crosses and trials. He cannot 
have his own way. He cannot gratify himself by accomplish- 
ing his own wishes and desires. He may beat and dash him- 
self against the everlasting rocks of God's will and God's 
way, but break through and carry all before him he cannot. 
He must be crossed and recrossed, and crossed again, until he 
will fall into the Divine order, and sink into the will of God. 

17. The backslider in heart will be filled with his own tem- 
pers. Having forsaken God, he will be sure to have much to 
irritate him. In a backslidden state, he cannot possess his 
soul in patience. The vexations of his backslidden life will 
make him nervous and irritable ; his temper will become ex- 
plosive and uncontrollable. 

18. The backslider in heart shall be full of his own dis- 
graces. He is a professor of religion. The eyes of the world 



426 BACKSLIDEPw IN HEART. 

are upon him, and all Lis inconsistencies, worldly-mindedness, 
follies, bad tempers, and hateful words and deeds, disgrace 
him in the estimation of all men who know him. 

19. The backslider in heart will be full of his own delusions. 
Having an evil eye, his whole body will be full of darkness. 
He will almost certainly fall into delusions in regard to doc- 
trines, and in regard to practices. Wandering on in darkness, 
as he does, he will, very likely, swallow the grossest delusions. 
Spiritism, Mormonism, Universalism, and every other ism 
that is wide from the truth, will be very likely to gain posses- 
sion of him. Who has not observed this of backsliders in 
heart. 

20. The backslider in heart will be filled with his own bond- 
age. His profession of religion brings him into bondage to 
the church. He has no heart to consult the interests of the 
church, or to labor for its up-building, and yet he is under 
covenant obligation to do so, and his reputation is at 
stake. He must do something to sustain religious institu- 
tions, but to do so, is a bondage. If he does it, it is because 
he must and not because he may. Again, he is in bondage to 
God. If he performs any, that he calls religious duty, it is 
rather as a slave than as a freeman. He serves from fear or 
hope, just like a slave, and not from love. Again, he is in 
bondage to his own conscience. To avoid conviction ,and re- 
morse, he will do or omit many things, but it is all with re- 
luctance, and not at all of his own cordial good will/ 

21. The backslider in heart is full of his own self-condem- 
nation. Having enjoyed the love of God, and forsaken him, 
he feels condemned for everything. If he attempts religious 
duty, he knows there is no heart in it, and hence condemns 
himself. If he neglects religious duty, he of course condemns 
himself. If he reads his Bible, it condemns him. If he does 
not read it, he feels condemned. If he goes to meeting, the 
services condemn him, and if he stays away, he is condemned. 
If he prays in secret, in his family, or in public, he knows he 
is not sincere, and feels condemned. If he neglects or refuses 
to pray, he feels condemned. Everything condemns him. 
His conscience is up in arms against him, and the thunders 
and lightnings of condemnation follow him, whithersoever he 
goes. 

V. How to recover from a state of backsliding. 

1. Remember whence you are fallen. Take up the question 
at once, and deliberately contrast your present state with that 
in which you walked with God. 

2. Take home the conviction of your true position. No 



BACKSLIDER IN HEART. 427 

longer delay to understand the exact situation between God 
and jour soul. 

3. Eepent at once, and do your first work over again. 

4. Do not attempt to get back, by reforming your mere 
outside conduct. Begin with your heart, and at once set 
yourself right with God. 

5. Do not act like a mere convicted sinner, and attempt to 
recommend yourself to God, by any impenitent works or 
prayers. Do not think that you must reform, and make your- 
self better before you can come to Christ, but understand 
distinctly, that coming to Christ, alone, can make you better. 
However much distressed you may feel, know for a certainty 
that until you repent and accept his will, unconditionally, 
you are no better, but are constantly growing worse. Until 
you throw yourself upon his sovereign mercy, and thus return 
to God, he will accept nothing at your hands. 

6. Do not imagine yourself to be in a justified state, for you 
know you are not. Your conscience condemns you, and you 
know that God ought to condemn you, and if he justified you 
in your present state, your conscience could not justify him. 
Come, then, to Christ at once, like a guilty, condemned sinner, 
as you are, own up, and take all the shame and blame to 
yourself, and believe that notwithstanding all your wanderings 
from God, he loves you still — that he has loved you with an 
everlasting love, and, therefore, with loving kindness is draw- 
ing you. * 



LECTURE XXII. 



GBOWTH IN GRACE. 



Text— But grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
Christ.— 2 Pet. iii. 18. 

I must conclude this Course of Lectures by giving con- 
verts instructions on the subject of growth in grace. I shall 
pursue the following method : 

I. What is graee, as the term is here used ? 

IL What the injunction "to grow in grace" does not 
mean. 

ITT. What it does mean. 

IV. Conditions of growth in grace. 
V. What is not proof of growth in grace. 
VL What is proof of growth in grace. 

VH. How to grow in grace. 

I. What is grace, as the term is here used ? 

1. Grace is favor. It is often used in the Bible to signify 
a free gift. The grace of God is the favor of God, His free 
gifts. 

IL What the injunction "to grow in grace" does not 
mean. 

1. It does not enjoin the gradual giving up of sin. Strange 
to tell, it would seem that some have so understood it ; but 
we are nowhere in the Bible commanded to give up sin grad- 
ually, we are everywhere commanded to give it up instantly 
and wholly. • 

m. What it does mean. 

1. It enjoins upon us the duty of growing in the favor of 
God, of growing in his esteem, in a worthiness of his favor, 
and in his love of complacency in us. 

IV. Conditions of growth in grace. 

1. Growth or increase in anything implies a beginning. 
Growth in the favor of God implies that we have already found 
favor in his sight, and that we are already indebted for grace 
received, and that we are already in grace, in the sense of 
having a place among his favored ones. 

2. Consequently, growth in grace implies that we have al- 
ready repented of our sin, have actually and practically aban- 
doned all known sin. It cannot be that we are in favor with 

(428) 



GROWTH IN GRACE. 429 

God if we are still indulging in known sin against him. 
Being in favor with God implies, of course, that we are par- 
doned and favored by him, for the sake of our Lord and 
Saviour Jesus Christ. Pardon is favor, and implies the re- 
nunciation of rebellion against God. The conditions of the 
Divine favor, as revealed in the Bible, are repentance and, 
abandonment of all known sin, and faith in our Lord Jesus 
Christ. I said, as a condition of growth in grace, we must 
have the commencement of grace ; in other words, we must 
be already Christians, must be in a state of acceptance with 
God, must have accepted Christ, so far as he is understood, 
must be in a state of obedience to all the recognized will of 
God. Without this, we cannot be in a state of grace, or in 
the favor of God. But being in this state, there is room for 
everlasting growth. As we know more of God, we shall be 
capable of loving him more, of having a more universal and 
implicit confidence in him. And there can be no end to this 
while we have any being, either in this or any other world. 
Our love and confidence in him may be complete, so far as 
we know him. This love and confidence will secure his 
favor ; but there will be no end to our growth in knowledge 
of him, and, consequently, there is room for eternal growth 
in grace. The more we love, the more we believe, the more 
we know of God, if we conform to all this knowledge, the 
more God must be pleased with us, the higher shall we stand 
in his favor, and more and greater gifts he will continue to 
bestow upon us. 

3. Of course, growth in the knowledge of God is a condi- 
tion of growth in his favor. We might grow in knowledge, 
without growing in his favor, because we might not love and 
trust him in accordance with this increased knowledge. But 
we cannot love* and trust him more perfectly, unless we be* 
come more perfectly acquainted with him. If our love and 
faith keep pace with our growing knowledge, we must grow 
in his favor. But growth in knowledge must be a condition 
of growth in love and faith. 

4. Growth in the knowledge of God, as revealed in Christ 
Jesus, must be a condition of growth in his favor. It is in 
and through Christ Jesus that God reveals himself to man. 
It is in Christ Jesus that we get the true idea of the person- 
ality of the infinite God. Hence, the text says, " Grow in 
grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 

Christ" 

5. Growth in grace is conditioned on increased knowledge 
of what is involved in entire consecration to God. 



430 GROWTH IN GRACE. 

True conversion to God involves the consecration of our- 
selves and of all that we have to him, so far as we understand 
what is implied in this. But, at first, converts are by no 
means aware of all that is involved in the highest forms of 
consecration. They will soon learn that there are certain 
things that they did not think of, and that they did not give 
up to God. At first, perhaps, all that was in their thought 
was, to lay their naked soul upon the altar, and give up their 
whole heart to God. But soon they may learn that they did 
not think of all their possessions and everything that was 
dear to them, they did not surrender all, and leave not a hoof 
behind. They surrendered all of which they thought at the 
time, but they were not fully enlightened, they did not think, 
nor could they think, at the time, of every appetite, passion, 
propensity, of every desire and affection, of everything they 
call their own, and which is dear to them, in the whole crea- 
tion, to make a thorough surrender and delivery of them all 
to God. To gain such knowledge is a work of time ; and 
growth in the favor of God is conditioned on making a full sur- 
render and consecration to God of everything we are, and have, 
and desire, and love, as fast as these objects are presented 
to thought. As long as we exist, and knowledge increases, 
there is no doubt that we shall be called upon to grow in 
grace, by consecrating to God every new object of knowledge, 
of desire, and of affection, that we may come to know, and 
desire, and love, to all eternity. As you get new light, you 
must enlarge your consecration from day to day, and from 
hour to hour, or you will cease to grow in grace. Whenever 
you stop short, and do not lay and leave everything that 
you are, that you possess, or that you love, upon the altar of 
consecration, that moment you cease to gryw in grace. I 
pray you let this saying sink deep into your hearts. 

6. Another condition of growth in grace is intense earnest- 
ness and constancy in seeking increased religious light, by 
the illumination of the Holy Spirit. You will gain no effectual 
religious light except by the inward showing and teaching of 
the Holy Spirit. This you will not obtain unless you continue 
in the true attitude of a disciple of Christ. Remember, he 
says, "Except a man forsake all that he hath, he cannot 
be my disciple." He will not, by his Holy Spirit, be your 
Divine teacher unless you renounce self, and live in a state 
of continual consecration to him. To obtain and preserve 
the teachings of Christ, by his Holy Spirit, you must con- 
tinually and earnestly pray for his Divine teaching, and watch 
against resisting and grieving him. 



GROWTH IN GRACE. 431 

7. Another condition of growth in grace is a constant con- 
formity to all the teachings of the Holy Spirit, keeping up 
with our convictions of duty, and with our growing knowledge 
of the will of God. 

8. A more and more implicit faith in God is a condition of 
growth in grace. By implicit, I mean an unreasoning faith, 
a confidence in God's character so profound that we trust 
him in the dark as well as in the light, as well when we do 
not understand the reasons of His dealings with us, or of His 
requirements, as when we do. A faith like that of Abraham, 
that staggered not at a promise, through unbelief, though the 
thing promised seemed most irrational and impossible. An 
implicit faith is an unwavering, unquestioning faith, a state of 
mind that will rest in God, in his promises, in his faithful- 
ness, in his love, whatever appearances may be, and however 
trying and apparently unreasonable his commands or provi- 
dential dealings may be. Abraham's faith is often commended 
in the Bible. God had promised him a son, but did not give 
him the promised seed until he was a hundred years old, and 
Sarah was ninety. But notwithstanding Sarah was past age, 
and he as good as dead, he believed that God was able to ful- 
fill his promise, and when he had received his beloved son, 
with the assurance that this was to be his heir, and that 
through him the promise was to be fulfilled through all genera- 
tions, God tried his faith severely, by commanding him to 
offer his Isaac as a burnt sacrifice. He without the least hesi- 
tation obeyed, believing that God was able to raise him from 
the dead. He made aU his arrangements to obey this trying 
command, with such calmness that neither Sarah nor Isaac 
suspected that any such thing was in contemplation. This 
was an instance of the exercise of implicit faith. Growth in 
grace, or in the favor of God, is conditioned upon growth in 
implicit confidence in Him. 

9. A more thoroughly sanctified sensibility is a condition 
of growth in the fa^vor of God. By the sensibility, I mean 
that department of our nature that feels, desires, and to which 
belongs all that we call desire, affection, emotion, feeling, ap- 
petite, passion, propensity, lust. The sensibility is an invol- 
untary power, and moral actions and qualities cannot, with 
strict propriety, be predicated of it. The states of the sensi- 
bility have moral character only as they derive it directly or 
indirectly from the action of the will The nature of man, as 
a whole, in his depraved condition, is in a very unlovely state, 
and although the will may be given up to God, the sensibility 
may be in such a state as to be very unlovely in the sight of 



432 GROWTH IN GRACE. 

one that looks directly upon it, and knows perfectly every 
excited desire, passion, propensity, lust. It is through the 
sensibility, mainly, that we are assailed with temptations. It 
is through this that the Christian warfare is kept up. The 
Christian warfare consists in the battle of the will with these 
various appetites, passions, propensities and lusts, to keep 
them in subjection to the will of God. If the will maintains 
its integrity, and cleaves to the will of God, the soul does not 
sin in its battle with the excited states of the sensibility. But 
these rebellious propensities embarrass the will in the service 
it renders to God. To keep them under, occupies much time, 
and thought, and strength. Hence the soul cann6t render 
to God so complete a service, while exerting the full strength 
of the will to subjugate these propensities, as it otherwise 
might and would render. These appetites, passions, and pro- 
pensities, although not sinful in themselves, have been re- 
garded and spoken of as indwelling sin. Strictly, they cannot 
be sin, because they are involuntary. But they are often a 
great hindrance to our growth in the favor of God. " For 
the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit lusteth 
against the flesh, and these are contrary, the one to the other, 
so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. " This means 
that we cannot do for God what we otherwise would, because 
we have to battle so much with the states of the sensibility, 
to keep them under. As the sensibility becomes more and 
more subdued and in harmony with the will's devotion to God, 
we are left free to render to God a more unembarrassed ser- 
vice. Therefore, the more thorough the sanctification of the 
sensibility, the more thoroughly we are in favor with God. 

10. A growing thoroughness and universality of consecra- 
tion, of spirit, soul, and body, is the condition of more and 
more growth in the favor of God. It is common, at first, for 
the steadfastness of the will's devotion to God to be overcome 
by the clamor of the excited appetites, passions, and propen- 
sities, or by the various states of the sensibility. Whenever 
the will yields to these excited states, you sin. But, in such 
cases, the sin is not willful, in the sense of being deliberate 
and intentional ; it is rather a slip, an inadvertency, a mo- 
mentary yielding under the pressure of highly excited feeling. 
Nevertheless, this yielding is sin. However excited the states 
of the sensibility may be, if the will does not yield, there is 
strictly no sin. Still, while the will is steadfast, maintains its 
consecration, its obedience to God, the appetites originating 
in the body, and the various propensities of the soul, which 
inhere in the sensibility, may be so ajar, in such confusion, 



GROWTH IN GRACE. 433 

and in such a state of morbid development, that the soul 
may be unfitted, for the employments and enjoyments of 

heaven. 

11. Hence, the taking on of a greater fullness of the Divine 
nature is a condition of growth in the favor of God. Both 
the will and the sensibility of God. must be in a state of ut- 
most perfection and accord. All of his desires and feelings 
must be in perfect harmony with his intelligence and his 
will. Not so with us, in our state of physical depravity. The 
depravity of sensibility must be physical, because it is invol- 
untary. Still, it is depravity, it is a lapsed or fallen state of 
the sensibility. This lapsed department of our nature must 
be recovered, sanctified, or completely restored to harmony 
with a consecrated will, and an enlightened intelligence, or 
we are never fitted for heaven. As we become more and 
more the partakers of the Divine nature, and of the Divine 
holiness, we are more fully sanctified in spirit, soul, and body, 
and of course grow more and more in the favor of God. 

12. A greater and more all-pervading fullness of the Holy 
Spirit's residence is another condition of growth in the favor of 
God. Tou cannot have it too thoroughly impressed upon you 
that every step in the Christian life is to be taken under the 
influence of the Holy Spirit The thing tq be attained is the 
universal teaching and guidance of the Holy Spirit, so that in 
oil things you shall be led by the Spirit of God. K If ye are 
led by the Spirit, ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh," If 
through the Spirit ye do mortify the deeds of the body, ye 
shall live." " To be spiritually minded is life and peace, but 
to be carnally minded is death." Always remember, there- 
fore, that to grow in grace, you must grow in the possession 
of the fullness of the Holy Ghost in your heart. 

13. A deeper personal acquaintance with the Lord Jesus 
Christ, in all his official work and relations, is a condition of 
.growth in grace. His nature, work, and relations are the 
theme of the Bible. The Bible presents hi m to us in a great 
variety of relations. In my Systematic Theology I have con- 
sidered some sixty or more of these official relations of Christ 
to the human race, and these are presented rather as speci- 
mens and illustrations than as covering the whole ground of 
his relations to us. Now, it is one thing to know Christ sim- 
ply on paper, and as spoken of in the Bible, by reading or 
hearing of Christ, and quite another thing to know him per- 
sonally, in these relations. The Bible is the medium of intro- 
duction to him personally. "What is there said of him is de- 
signed to lead us to seek after a personal acquaintance with 

19 



434 GROWTH IX GRACE. 

him. It is by this personal acquaintance with him. that we 
are made like him. It is by direct, personal, individual inter- 
course with his Divine mind that we take on his image. " All 
we, beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed 
into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit 
of the Lord." "Faith comes by hearing/' and faith secures 
for us a personal acquaintance with Christ. Christ has pro- 
mised to manifest himself personally to those who love and 
obey him. Do not, my dear children, stop short of securing 
this personal manifestation of Christ to your souls. Tour 
growth in grace will depend upon this. Think not of stop- 
ping short of personally knowing Christ, not only in all these 
relations, but in the fullness of these relations. Do not over- 
look the fact that the appropriation of Christ, in each of these 
relations, is a personal act of faith. It is a putting on of the 
Lord Jesus Christ, a taking of him as yours, in each of these 
relations, as your wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and 
redemption ; your prophet, to teach you, your king, to govern 
you, your high priest, to atone for you, your mediator^ your 
advocate, your strength, your Saviour, your hiding-place, your 
high tower, your captain and leader, your shield, your de- 
fence, your exceeding great reward. In each of these rela- 
tions, and in all other of his official relations, you need to ap- 
propriate him by faith so as to secure to you personal in- 
tercourse with him in these relations. Growing in a per- 
sonal acquaintance with him, in these relations, remember, 
is an indispensable condition of growth in his favor. 

V. I am to notice some things that are not proof of growth 
in grace. 

1. Growth in knowledge is not conclusive evidence of growth 
in grace. Some degree of knowledge is indispensable to our 
being in favor with God ; and growth in knowledge, as I 
have shown, is a condition of growth in grace, but knowledge 
is not grace, and growth in knowledge does not constitute 
growth in grace. A person may grow ever so much in knowl- 
edge, and have no grace at all. In hell, they cannot but grow 
in knowledge, as they grow in experience, and in the knowl- 
edge of God's justice. But there, their growth in knowledge 
but aggravates the guilt and misery of hell. They know 
more and more of God and his law, and their own guilt, and 
the more they know, the more wretched they are. From their 
increased knowledge they never learn piety. 

2. It is not certain evidence that an individual grows in 
grace, because he grows in gifts. 

A professor of religion may increase in gifts, that is, he may 



GROWTH IN GRACE. 435 

become more fluent in prayer, and more eloquent in preach- 
ing, or more pathetic in exhortation without being any more 
holy. We naturally increase in that in which we exercise 
ourselves. And if any person often exercises himself in ex- 
hortation, he will naturally, if he makes any effort or lays 
himself out, increase in fluency and pungency. But he may 
do all this, and yet have no grace at all. He may pray ever 
so engagedly, and increase in fluency and apparent pathos, 
and yet have no grace. People who have no grace often do 
so. It is true, if he has grace, and exercises himself in these 
things, as he grows in grace, he will grow in gifts. No person 
can exercise himself in obeying God, without improving in 
those exercises. If he does not improve in gifts, it is a true 
sign he does not grow in grace. But, on the other hand, it is 
not sure evidence that he grows in grace because he im- 
proves in certain exercises, for he will naturally improve by 
practice, whether he is a Christian or a hypocrite. 

3. It is not proof that a person grows in grace, because he 
thinks he is doing so. One may be very favorably impressed 
with regard to his own progress in religion, when it is evident 
to others that he is not only making no progress, but is, in 
fact, declining. An individual who is growing worse and 
worse, is not ordinarily well aware of the fact. It is not un- 
common for both impenitent sinners and Christians to think 
they are growing better, when they are growing no better. 
This results from the very nature of the case. If any person 
is growing worse, his conscience will, for the time being, be- 
come more and more seared, and his mind more and more 
dark, as he stifles conscience and resists the light. Then he 
may think he is growing better, just because he has less sense 
of sin, and while his conscience continues to sleep, he may 
continue under a fatal delusion. A man will judge of his own 
spiritual state as he compares himself with a high or low 
standard. If he keeps Christ before him, in his fullness, as 
his standard, he will doubtless always, at least in this state of 
existence, have but a low estimate of his own attainments. 
While at the same time, if he sets before himself the church, 
or any of the members of the church as a standard, he will 
be very likely to form a high estimate of his. progress in relig- 
ion, and be verv well satisfied with himself. This is the rea- 
son why there is such a difference in people's views of their 
own state and of the state of the church. They compare them- 
selves and the state of the church with different standards. 
Hence, one takes a very humbling view of his own state, and 
complains of that of the church ; another thinks such com- 



436 GROWTH IX GRACE. 

plaints of the church censorious. To him the church appears 
to be doing very well. The reason why he does not think the 
church cold, and in a low state, is that Christ is not his stand- 
ard of comparison. If a man shuts his eyes, he will not see 
the defilement on him, and may think he is clean, while to all 
around he appears loathsome. 

VI. "What is proof of growth in grace. 

1. The manifestation of more implicit and universal trust 
in God is an evidence of growth in grace. The exercise of 
greater and more implicit confidence, as I have said, is the 
condition of growing in the favor of God. Here, I say, that 
the manifestation of this implicit and universal confidence is 
proof that this growing confidence exists, and is, therefore, 
satisfactory evidence of growth in the favor of God. If you 
are conscious in your own soul that you do exercise more im- 
plicit and universal confidence in God, this is conclusive proof 
to you that you are growing in grace, and as you manifest in 
your life, and temper, and spirit, this growing confidence, you 
prove to yourself and to others that you are growing in the 
favor of God. For as you grow in implicit confidence in him 
you must grow in his favor. 

2. Another evidence of growth in grace, is an increasing 
weanedness from the world. The will may be in an attitude 
of devotion to God, while the world's seductive charms very 
much embarrass the healthy action of the Christian life. 
As the soul becomes crucified and dead to the world, it grows 
in the favor of God. 

3. Less reluctance of feeling, when called to the exercise of 
self-denial, is an evidence of growth in grace. It shows that 
the feelings are becoming less and less despotic, that the will 
is getting more the mastery of them, that the sensibility is 
getting more into harmony with the devotion of the will, 
and the dictates of the intelligence. 

4. Less temptation to sins of omission, is another evidence 
of growth in grace, e. g. 9 less temptation to shun the cross, to 
neglect unpleasant duties, less temptation to indolence, less 
temptation to shirk responsibility, less temptation to neglect 
prayer, reading the Scriptures, private and family devotions, 
in short, less and less temptation to shun the performance of 
any duty, is evidence of growth in grace. These temptations 
consist in the excited states of the sensibility. As these be- 
come less in strength and frequency, we learn that our sensi- 
bility is becoming more completely subjugated to the law of 
the intelligence, and the decisions of the will, and consequent- 
ly, that the work of the sanctification of the spirit, soul and 



GROWTH IN GRACE. 437 

body is progressing, and that therefore we are growing in the 
favor of God. 

5. A growing intensity and steadiness of zeal in promoting 
the cause of God, is evidence of growth in the favor of God. 
Sometimes Christian zeal is comparatively cool, at other times 
deep and intense, sometimes it will be steady, at other times 
fitful and evanescent. As Christians grow in piety, their zeal 
becomes deep, intense and steady, and as you are conscious 
of this, and in your life and spirit give evidence of it to 
others, you have, and give proof, that you are growing in the 
favor of God. 

6. Losing more and more the consciousness of self, and 
respect to self, in every action of life, is an evidence of growth 
in the favor of God. Some have so much consciousness of 
self in everything, and so much respect to self in everything 
they say and do, as to be embarrassed in all their Christian 
life, whenever they attempt to act or speak in the presence of 
others. As they lose this self-consciousness, and have less 
respect to self, their service of God becomes more free and un- 
embarrassed, and they are all the better servants by how much 
less they think of self. Sonetimes young converts cannot 
speak or pray, or perform any public duty, without being 
either proud or ashamed, as they think themselves to have 
performed those duties with more or less acceptance to those 
around them. While this is so, their piety is in a feeble 
.state. They must lose sight of their own glory, and have a 
single eye to the glory of God, to find acceptance with him. 
But as they lose sight of self, and set God always before 
them, having an eye single to his glory, they grow more and 
more in his favor. 

7. Consequently, a growing deadness to the flattery or the 
censure of men, is an evidence of growth in grace. Paul had 
grown in grace so much, that he counted it a light thing to 
be judged of man, he only sought to commend himself to 
God. As you find yourself growing in this state of deadness 
to the flatteries or censures of men, you have evidence that 
you grow in grace. 

8. A growing cordiality in the acceptance of the whole will 
of God, is evidence of growth in his favor. Some rebel 
against his will as revealed in his word, and in his provi- 
dence. Others, under trying circumstances will barely tole- 
rate his will, as revealed in his word and in providence ; but 
those who are growing in grace, find it more natural to them, 
te embrace his whole revealed will, with greater and greater 
cordiality. 



438 GROWTH IN GRACE. 

9. Growing calmness and quietness tinder great afflictions, 
is an evidence of growth, in the fayor of God. This evinces 
a broader and more implicit faith, a fuller and more cor- 
dial acceptance of the will of God, as revealed in these afflic- 
tions, and shows that the soul is more steadily and firmly at 
anchor upon its rock, Christ. 

10. A growing tranquillity under sudden and crushing disas- 
ters and bereavements, is an evidence of growth in grace. 
The more tranquil the soul can remain, when sudden storms 
of providence come upon it, sweeping away its loved ones, 
and blighting its earthly hopes, the greater is its evidence of 
being under the particular favor of God. This tranquillity 
is both a result and an evidence of the favor of God. 

11. Growing patience under much provocation, is an evi- 
dence of growth in the favor of God. 

12. "Long suffering with joyfulness," is an evidence of 
growing in favor with God. When you find that you can, 
not only tolerate, but accept the will of God, as revealed in 
calling you to suffer, and especially, when you can accept 
these sufferings, and endure them long and with joyfulness, 
you have evidence that you are growing in the favor of God. 

13. A growing cordiality and joyfulness under crosses and 
disappointments, and severe pain, is evidence of growth in 
the favor of God. 

14 An increasing deadness to all that the world has to 
offer, or to threaten, is an evidence of growth in the favor 
of God. 

15. A growing repose in, and satisfaction with, all the allot- 
ments of providence, is an evidence of growth in grace. 

16. Less temptation to murmur or repine at any allotment 
of providence, is evidence of growth in grace. 

17. Less temptation to fret, when we are crossed or dis- 
appointed in any respect, is an evidence of growth in grace. 

18. Less and less temptation to resentment, and the spirit 
of retaliation, when we are in anywise insulted or abused, is 
evidence that the sensibility is becoming more and more thor- 
oughly subdued, and consequently, that we are growing in 
favor with God. 

19. Less temptation to dwell upon, and to magnify our 
trials and troubles, to think of them, and speak of them to 
others, is evidence that we think less and less of self, and ac- 
cept our trials and troubles with more and more complacency 
in God. It is sad to hear some professedly good people, 
dwelling ever upon, and magnifying their own troubles and 
trials. But, if they grow in grace, they will think less and 



GROWTH IN GRACE. 439 

less of these, be more inclined to think of them as " light af- 
flictions." The more we grow in grace, the less stress we lay 
upon the evils we meet with in the way. Said a good man 
to me once, who was really passing through what the world 
would call very severe trials and afflictions (he had lost a 
beloved wife, and his children had died one after another), 
"I have many mercies, and few afflictions." When, under 
such circumstances, a man can say, " the lines have fallen 
unto me in pleasant places, I have a goodly heritage," he has 
the most satisfactory .evidence that he is growing in the favor 
of God. For this state of mind is both a result and an evi- 
dence of the favor of God. 

20. A growing disposition to make light of our trials and 
to magnify our blessings, is an evidence that we are growing 
in the favor of God. 

21. Less and less anxiety and carefulness about the events 
of providence, and especially about the things that nearly and 
deeply affect ourselves, is evidence of growth in grace. This 
is an evidence of a broader and more implicit faith, of a more 
submissive will, and of a chminishing tendency to self-seeking; 
and is, therefore, an evidence of growing favor with God. 

22. Being less and less disturbed and troubled by the 
events of life, especially those that go counter to our own 
plans, and hopes, and expectations, and desires, and that 
thwart our most cherished aims, is an evidence of growth in 
grace. 

23. A growing and realizing confidence in the wisdom, be- 
nevolence, and universality of the providence of God, a state 
of mind that sees God in eveiything, is evidence of growth 
in grace. Some minds become so spiritual that they hardly 
seem to reside in the body, and appear continually to perceive 
the presence of God in every event, almost as if they were 
disembodied, and beheld God, face to face. They seem to 
dwell, live, move, and have their being, rather in the spiritual, 
than in the natural world. They are continually under such 
a sense of the Divine presence, agency, and protection, as 
hardly to appear like inhabitants of earth. They are a living, 
walking mystery to those in the midst of whom they dwell The 
springs of then activity are so divine, their life is so much 
hidden in God, they act under influences so far above the 
world, that they cannot be judged by the same standards as 
other men. Carnal minds cannot understand them. Then 
hidden life is so unknown, and so unknowable to those who are 
far below them in their spiritual life, that they are necessarily 
regarded as quite eccentric, as being mystics or monomaniacs, 



440 GKOWTH IN GRACE. 

and as having very peculiar religious views, as being enthusi- 
asts, and perhaps fanatics. These persons are in the world, 
but they live above the world. They have so far escaped from 
the pollutions that are in. the world, that they can truly, and 
understandingly say with Paul, in Gal. vi. 14, "But God for- 
bid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, whereby the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the 
world." Such persons are evidently growing in the grace of 
God. 

24. Being less and less disposed to dwell upon the faults 
and foibles of others, is an evidence of growth in grace. 

25. Being less and less disposed to speak sarcastically or 
severely, or to judge uncharitably of others. A growing deli- 
cacy, or tenderness in speaking of their real or supposed 
faults, behind their back, is an evidence of growth in grace. 

26. An increasing reluctance to regard or treat any one as 
an enemy, and an increasing ease and naturalness in treating 
them kindly, in praying for them heartily, and in efforts to do 
them good, is an evidence of growth in grace. 

27. Less and less temptation to remember an injiiry, and 
the abatement of all desire to retaliate when injured, is an 
evidence of growth in grace. 

28. A growing readiness and cordiality in forgiving and 
burying an injury out of sight, and a kind, of moral inability 
to do otherwise than seek the highest good of those who have 
injured us most deeply, is an evidence of growth in grace. 

29. When we find in our own experience, and manifest to 
others, that it is more and more natural to regard all men as 
our brethren, especially to drop out of view all sectarian dis- 
criminations, all ideas and prejudices of caste, and of color, 
of poverty, and of riches, of blood relation, and of natural, 
rather than of spiritual ties, and to make common cause with 
God, in aiming to do good to all men, to enemies and friends 
alike, we have then ourselves, and give to others, the highest 
evidence of our growing in the favor of God. 

30. Especially is it true, when we find ourselves very cor- 
dial and full-hearted, in making great sacrifices for those that 
hate us, and having a willingness to lay down our lives, to 
promote their eternal salvation, that we have evidence of 
growth in grace. 

31. Still more especially, when we find ourselves less and 
less inclined to account anything a sacrifice that we can do for 
God, or the souls of men ; when we can account our lives not 
dear unto us, if called to lay them down to save the souls of ; 
enemies, when, for the "joy of saving them," "we can endure 



GKOWTH IN GRACE. 441 

the cross, and despise the shame/' or any sacrifice that we are 
called to make, we have evidence that we are growing in favor 
with God. 

32. Again, when we find ourselves more and more inclined 
to " count it all joy, when we fall into clivers temptations," 
and when we are disposed to look upon our trials, vexations, 
losses, and crosses, in such a light as to lay less and less stress 
upon them, we have evidence that we are growing in patience, 
and therefore, in favor with God. 

33. "When we find less and less reluctance to making full 
confession to those whom we have injured, when with increas- 
ing readiness and cordiality we lay our hearts open to be 
searched, take home conviction of wrong-doing, and when in 
such cases, we cannot rest till we have made the fullest con- 
fession and reparation within our power, when to own up, 
and confess, and make the fullest satisfaction, is a luxury to 
us, rather than a trial and a cross, we have evidence that we 
are growing in the favor of God. 

34. When we are more and more impressed and affected by 
the mercies of God, and by the kindnesses of our fellow-men 
and those around us, when we more deeply and thoroughly 
appreciate manifestations of kindness in God, or in any one 
else, when we are more and more humbled and affected by 
these kindnesses, and find it more and more natural to "walk 
humbly, love mercy, and do justly," and live gratefully, we 
have evidence that we are growing in favor with God. 

35. When we find ourselves drawn, with increasing earnest- 
ness to follow on to know more of the Lord, we have evi- 
dence of growth in grace. 

36. W 7 hen we find ourselves more and more readily im- 
pressed and affected, quickened and stimulated by religious 
truth, and when we find an increasing harmony in. the action 
of all our powers, intellectual, voluntary, a,nd sensitive, in ac- 
cepting, and resting m, the whole will and providence of God, 
however afflictive they may at present be, we have evidence 
that we are growing in grace. 

37. A growing jealously for the honor of God, for the purity 
and honor of his church, for the rights of God, and for the 
rights of all men, is evidence of growing in conformity to 
God, and, of course, of growing in his favor. 

VII. How to grow in grace. 

1. Fulfill the conditions noticed under the fourth head of 
this lecture. I need not repeat them. 

2. Eemember that every step of progress must be made by 
faith, and not by works. The mistake that some good men 

19* 



442 GROWTH IN GRACE. 

have made upon this subject, is truly amazing. Dr. Chalmers 
affirms, that the way to be sanctified is to work for it. A few 
years since, Dr. Pond published a pamphlet, in which he took 
ground on this subject, with Dr. Chalmers, and affirmed that 
the idea of being sanctified by faith was an absurdity. In- 
deed, the custom has been almost universal, to represent 
growth in grace as consisting in the formation of habits of 
obedience to God. Now, it is quite surprising that so many 
good men have fallen into this mistake. The fact is, that 
every step of progress in the Christian life, is taken by a 
fresh and fuller appropriation of Christ by faith, a fuller bap- 
tism of the Holy Spirit. As our weaknesses, infirmities, be- 
setting sins, and necessities, are revealed to us, by the circum- 
stances of temptation through which we pass, our only 
efficient help is found in Christ, and we grow only as we step 
by step more fully appropriate him, in one relation or another, 
and more fully " put him on." As we are more and more 
emptied of self-dependence, as we more and more renounce 
and discard all expectation of forming holy habits by any 
obedience of ours, and as by faith we secure deeper and 
deeper baptisms of the Holy Ghost, and put on the Lord 
Jesus Christ, more and more thoroughly, and in more of his 
official relations, by just so much the faster do we grow in 
the favor of God. Nothing can be more erroneous and 
dangerous than the commonly received idea of growing in 
grace by the formation of holy habits. By acts of faith alone, 
we appropriate Christ, and we are as truly sanctified by faith 
as we are justified by faith. In my Systematic Theology, in 
pointing out the conditions of entire or permanent sanctifica- 
tion, I have noticed some sixty of the official relations of Christ, 
as I have before said, and have there insisted, as I here insist, 
that growth in holiness, and consequently, in the favor of 
God, is secured only by fresh, fuller, and more thorough ap- 
propriations of Christ, in all these official relations. If you 
would grow in grace you must do it through faith. You must 
pray in faith for the Holy Spirit. You must appropriate and 
put on Christ through the Holy Spirit. At every forward 
step in your progress, you must have a fresh anointing of the 
Holy Spirit through faith. 



REMARKS. 

1. We see, from this subject, the vast importance of rightly 
instructing young converts. In many cases, they have very little 
instruction suited to their experience and degree of Christian 



GROWTH IN GRACE. 443 

intelligence. By some, 'such views are taken of the Persever- 
ance of the Saints, that it is assumed that babes in Christ will 
grow without nursing, and without that sincere milk of the 
word, by means of which they must grow. Some, taking it for 
granted that they need instruction, unwittingly give them false 
instruction, set them to work outwardly and zealously, without 
paying much regard to the strengthening and developing of 
their inward life. They do not teach them how to appropriate 
and live on Christ as their life, but continually press them up, 
to do their duty, to labor for God, and labor for souls, not 
sufficiently impressing upon them the idea that their doing is 
of no account, unless it proceeds from the life of God in their 
own souls. The result of this is a bustling, outward activity, 
while the inward spiritual life is decaying. This must end in 
disgust at one's own want of heart, and a settling back into 
apathy and neglect. 

2. Sometimes there is a mistake made in the opposite direc- 
tion. They are taught to rest in Christ, in such a sense as to 
take on a type of quietism and antinomian inactivity. They 
are exhorted to exercise faith, but they are not earnestly im- 
pressed with the conviction that it must be a faith that works, 
and works by love, that purines the heart, and overcomes the 
world. The result is, they do nothing in religion. Sinners 
are allowed to sleep on, and go to hell, in their midst, and 
they make no effort to save them. 

3. We see the importance of a Holy Ghost anointed minis- 
try. The great want of the church is a ministry so thor- 
oughly anointed by the Holy Ghost as to know how to lead 
the church onward and upward, to the fullest development of 
Christian piety. In order to instruct converts, and keep the 
church progressing in holiness, the minister must progress 
himself. He must be a truly living, growing Christian. I 
have good reason to know that the churches in many places 
are deeply pained by the want of living piety and growth in 
their ministers. Their ministers are intellectual, literary, 
philosophical, theological, in their teaching, but they are sadly 
deficient in unction. They have but little power with God or 
with man. They instruct the intellect to a certain extent, but 
they do not meet the wants of the heart. Converts starve 
under their preaching. They preach an intellectual, rather 
than a spiritual Gospel. They preach religion as a theory, a 
doctrine, a philosophy, and not as a real living experience. It 
is often exceedingly painful to hear ministers preach who mani- 
festly do not know what they say, or whereof they affirm. 
They speak of religion as an inward sentiment, instead of 



444 GROWTH IN GKACE. 

heart devotion to God ; as an emotian, a feeling, instead of 
an all-embracing and efficient love, a voluntary state and atti- 
tude of the mind, from which necessarily proceeds a holy : life. 
They speak of faith as: -a mere intellectual state or convic- 
tion, and not as an act of trust, and of committal of the 
whole being, to do and suffer all the will of God. They speak 
of repentance as if it were a mere involuntary sorrow for sin. 
They do not teach that repentance is a change of mind toward 
God, a renunciation of the self-seeking spirit, and a turning 
of the whole mind to God. They speak of holiness, as if it 
were a state utterly unattainable in this life. Indeed, I say 
it with sorrow, but I must say it, the teaching of a great many 
ministers is but a stumbling-block to the church. Under 
their instruction, converts do not, and cannot get so estab- 
lished in grace as to be greatly useful, or to live lives that are 
honorable to Christ. Just think, in the Nineteenth Century, 
ministers preach to converts that they must grow in grace by 
works. Be heaven and earth amazed at this ! Such teachers 
do not know how to grow in grace themselves. Shall I be ac- 
counted harsh if I say, " They be blind leaders of the blind." 

4. We see the reason of so much backsliding. Converts 
will of course backslide who are led by false instruction. If, 
on the one hand, they are set to work out sanctification by 
works, their works will soon become dead works, and not be 
the result of that faith that works by love. If, on the other 
hand, they are crammed with abstract notions and doctrines, 
and taught to rest in an antinomian faith, they will sink 
into supineness and inactivity. I fully believe that in nearly 
all cases where there has been disastrous reaction after a re- 
vival, it has been owing to the want of timely and proper in- 
struction. But to be timely and proper, it must be anointed 
instruction. 

5. The Theological Seminaries need to pay vastly more at- 
tention to the growth in grace of their students. They need 
a professor of experimental religion, who has experience and 
power enough to press them 'along into those higher regions 
of Christian experience which are essential to their being able 
to lead the church on to victory. It is amazing to see how 
little effort is made to cultivate the heart of young men study- 
ing for the ministry. We must have a change in this respect. 
A much higher standard of Christian experience must be re- 
quired as a condition of ordination. It is painful to see how 
carefully men will be examined in regard to their intellectual 
attainments, while the accounts they give of then Christian 
experience will barely allow us to hope that they have been 



GROWTH IN GRACE. 445 

converted. How sad it is to set such young men to feed the 
church of God. How do old Christians mourn, when they 
see the appointed leaders in the church of God but spiritual 
babes. 

6. I have never been present at the examination of a candi- 
date for ordination where anything more than simple evidence 
of conversion was required of him. I never heard them 
questioned touching their progress in Christian experience, 
and regarding their spiritual ability to lead the flock of God 
into green pastures and beside the still waters. I never 
heard them questioned in a manner that manifested the 
slightest conception of what are the indispensable spiritual 
qualifications of a man who is to stand forth as the leader and 
spiritual instructor of the church of God. More hours are 
spent in ascertaining the intellectual attainments * of a candi- 
date than minutes to ascertain his spiritual and experimental 
attainments. The whole examination will plainly indicate 
that the ordaining body lay very little stress on this part of a 
minister's education. Is it any wonder that the church of 
God is so feeble and inefficient, while its leaders and teachers 
are, many of them, mere children in spiritual knowledge, 
while a ripe Christian experience is made no part of the in- 
dispensable education of a minister. Why, this is infinitely 
more dangerous and ridiculous than to intrust men to lead 
an army in the field, while they merely understand mathemat- 
ics, and never have had any training or experience in mili- 
tary matters. 

In this respect, too, there must be a great change. Churches 
should refuse to ordain and receive pastors, unless they are 
fully satisfied of their having made much progress in Chris- 
tian experience, so as to be able to lead on, and keep the 
church awake. 

They should insist upon the education of his heart as well 
as his head; upon his ability to take young converts, and con- 
duct them on to those deep experiences that will make them 
stable and efficient workers in the cause of God. Think of 
theological seminaries like those over which Dr. Chalmers 
and Dr. Pond have presided, where the leaders of the church 
of God are taught that sanctification or growth in grace is at- 
tained by works and not by faith. Tell it not in Gath. Alas 
for Zion, when her great and good men fall into such mis- 
takes. 

THE CXD. 



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